Broken Music (3 page)

Sometimes, the more restless young men left the village to seek work in the nail and chain shops, the iron foundries of Cradley Heath, Halesowen or Blackheath, the glass works in Stourbridge and Brierley Hill, or they went in the other direction, to the carpet factories in Kidderminster, looking for betterment, or purely from a sense of adventure. But mostly people stayed: there was usually enough work on the Oaklands Park estate and the farms, up at the gravel pits or the brickworks, and if you worked for the estate, they looked after you for life. Apart from that, there was nothing much else in Broughton: some small houses and cottages, the schoolhouse and the Greville Arms, the smithy next door, the church of St Ethelfleda and the gloomy rectory where the Wentworth family were to live. And of course, the Big House itself, Oaklands Park.

Amy had only the vaguest recollections of the family's first arrival in Broughton. Nella laughed and declared she could have had no recollections at all, since she was only four years old at the time; she only thought she had, from the stories she'd heard so often of that day when they had all arrived there. But she must have remembered some things, since she could hear in her mind, quite vividly, Grandy's shocked exclamation at her first sight of the rectory, dark and forbidding, its tall, dilapidated chimneys vying with the square church tower for height, looking as though it were being pulled back into the clutches of what seemed like a forest of ancient and forbidding dark yews behind it, planted too near the house. It was a huge barn of a place, built at a time when rectors regularly had families of ten, eleven or more. Missing slates, peeling paintwork, collapsed guttering…

Inside it was worse. Dusty, moth-eaten curtains; dark wallpaper, stained and discoloured by damp; old furniture from earlier decades, most of it no doubt the unwanted property of previous incumbents, since the huge pieces were all but immovable, left stranded about the place like beached whales. It was piercingly cold.

Worst of all was the big stained-glass staircase window which increased the gloom of the high, cavernous hall rather than lighting it. Mrs Villiers speculated on the nature of the rector who had chosen such a highly unsuitable subject for a window in a rectory. Susannah and the Elders. Who wanted to be faced every day when they came down the stairs with two lecherous old men spying on a young woman bathing in her garden? The girls giggled when they saw it, but fortunately the window was so dark and gloomy, and further obscured by the huge yews outside, that the subject could only be discerned properly on close inspection.

This unprepossessing house had become their new home entirely due to the elderly incumbent of St Ethelfleda's, the Reverend Wilfred Dorkings, having endured a particularly bad bout that year of his annual bronchitis, after which he had no option but to give up the struggle and live with his niece, the village schoolmistress, while still continuing as rector. Father Dorkings was a saintly bachelor who cared nothing for luxury (unless it was candles and incense in his High Church) and had lived mainly in the kitchen and his study, where he also slept, not even noticing the depredations which time, damp and neglect had wrought. Since he made no complaints to Lady Sybil, in whose gift the rectory and the living of St Ethelfleda were, the state of the house had gone unnoticed, and when she received the letter from Francis Wentworth (who had been a significant presence in her life since she was a child, her cousin Dorothea's husband, and a frequent visitor to Oaklands) telling her of his abrupt and astonishing abandonment of the ministry, and his having nowhere to live, she had made the offer of the now empty house.

On their arrival Eleanor Villiers, having summed up the situation in one look, set her lips in a firm line. ‘Very well!'

The next day, in a violet silk gown trimmed with ecru lace, her many-tailed furs dripping over her shoulders and clasped together over her bosom with the beady-eyed mask of the unfortunate little animal who had provided them, her best towering grey velvet and moiré hat skewered firmly to her hair with an outsize pearl hatpin, her first action was to have old Strudwick, the verger and sexton, harness the pony into the trap and drive up to Oaklands Park, taking the reins herself. She had known Sybil since she was a baby and, outraged at the dirt and discomfort they were expected to be grateful for, had no compunction in giving her a piece of her mind.

What had she been thinking of, she demanded, sitting very upright in the comfort of Lady Sybil's warm, flower-scented drawing room, sipping Earl Grey from delicate Crown Derby china balanced in her hand, what could have possessed Sybil to offer such a backhanded gift – nothing more than a hovel, when it came down to it, she added, exaggerating for good measure – to a bereaved, motherless, penniless family? This last was a further exaggeration. Francis was not, in fact, entirely penniless: he had a private income, though only just about adequate to cover William's school fees and the day-to-day expenses of looking after his family – and there was in fact nothing backhanded about Sybil's offer, though it had indeed crossed Eleanor's mind to wonder about the mixed motives which had caused her to offer the house, and Francis to accept.

Sybil was mortified. ‘Really? As bad as that, is it? I must confess I haven't had occasion to visit the rectory for years. I will certainly see that something is done at once.'

For all the fashionable clothes, the society manners, she hasn't really changed, Eleanor thought, she is still the same generous, impulsive, careless girl she always has been – in fact, she has turned out better than ever anyone would have expected, considering the circumstances of her upbringing. Sybil's mother had died when she was a young child, and her profligate and unheeding father, John Greville, Earl of Broughton, as careless of his only child's welfare as he was of his inheritance, had left her in the care of a succession of indifferent nurses and governesses who turned a blind eye to her roaming the countryside, wild as a deer, with the gamekeeper's son, until this state of affairs became no longer tenable even to her father. She was sent to live in London with his sister to be transformed from a hoyden into a young lady, relieving him of responsibility for her while he pursued his gambling and, under a mountain of debts, let the house slide into shabby and disgraceful ruin. The estate itself remained in better case, the earl having his reputation of being one of the best shots in England to keep up. Although he had found it necessary to sell land off piecemeal to stave off his debtors, the woods and coverts remained well managed and maintained.

Despite her protests, Sybil's eventual debut into society was a success, if measured by the whirl of her activities, the friends she made. She was never a beauty, her features were too strong for that, but she was lively and popular and learnt how to dress well. It would have amazed no one if she had sold up and never returned to the dereliction that was Oaklands on her father's death, but in fact she had confounded everyone by marrying a rich industrialist much older than herself, whose money enabled her to restore the house to its former glory. Arthur Foley was a self-made man and something of a rough diamond, but he had a kind heart and Mrs Villiers wouldn't have been surprised if he hadn't had something to do with Sybil's offer of the rectory.

She was wrong in this. Sybil was, in fact, taken aback by a situation she hadn't truly known to exist, and aghast at how her neglect of her rector must have appeared. Moreover, the picture painted by Mrs Villiers had brought back to her what it was like to live in a run-down house – a hateful memory never far from her mind – and she promised to make amends, by way of despatching workmen to repair the roof, to paint and paper, hang new curtains and do anything else that needed to be done. Incapable of doing anything by halves, she went on to suggest that the two eldest girls, Marianne and Nella, might be allowed to share her daughter's governess for their lessons. Miss Osgood only had Eunice to teach, her brother, Greville, being away at school, of course.

Much mollified by all this, Mrs Villiers forgave. She thanked Sybil warmly, and added that she thought Francis might well agree to this solution to the girls' education, something he appeared not to have taken into account.

Her visit to Oaklands had in fact been most satisfactory, she decided as she drove the pony trap back and into the stable behind the rectory, but even so, she could not imagine how they were ever going to make this house into anything resembling a comfortable – even a warm – home.

But she and Florrie (who was already beginning to take on the indispensable role she was soon to occupy: nanny, housekeeper, cook, and dispenser of comfort, brisk advice and support) set themselves the task of creating order out of chaos and, as women do, quite enjoyed it if the truth be told.

There wasn't much they could do about the cold. The bedrooms were worst of all, stifling in summer but so icy in winter that the flowery patterns of hoar frost, actually inside the windows when the children woke, were sometimes still there when they went to bed at night.

Lady Sybil, however, had crowned her generosity with one hitherto unimaginable luxury: a bathroom was installed, with hot water provided by the kitchen boiler and stored in a huge copper cylinder that loomed like a leviathan in one corner of the bathroom, a great comfort on which all three girls, despite being expressly forbidden to do so, would perch in winter while Marianne told them stories she had made up, huddled together like birds on a chimney pot to get warm before diving between the icy sheets and curling up into a ball to conserve any warmth they'd managed to gain.

 

In a small village like Broughton Underhill, where nearly everyone was someone else's sister, parent, brother-in-law or cousin twice removed, newcomers were of intense interest and the Wentworths were at first objects of much speculation. Francis was, in fact, remembered by many as a frequent visitor to Oaklands, as a child and later, when he had spent weekends there taking part in the shoots, both before and after his marriage, and when word got around that he was in holy orders, it was believed that he was there to offer assistance to the ailing Father Dorkings and to be ready to step into his shoes when he retired. Instead, here they had a clergyman who rarely darkened the doors of the church, and never ministered; a gentleman who was obviously of somewhat straitened means, yet who was not visibly employed. His tall figure soon became a familiar sight, tramping interminable miles over the hills, that great woolly sheepdog at his heels, and eventually it came to be accepted that he was unlikely to be seen much in church, alongside the rest of his family. Mrs Villiers saw to it that they, at least, attended the services every Sunday. The children were often about the village, where they were liked for their unaffected manners, especially little Amy, who chattered to everyone and was given sweets and patted on the head because she looked so pretty.

 

Eunice, with whom the girls now shared lessons, was pretty too, a sweet-natured creature, but so shy and timid with anyone she didn't know well, it was painful to watch. She was a delicate little girl who suffered from a bad chest and indeed looked as if a puff of wind would blow her away. Grev they only saw when he was home from Shrewsbury. An intense boy, very highly strung, his dark eyes too big for his pale face, he was doted on by his mother. Funny Grev, people said, so odd, but so talented. He was always playing some musical instrument or other – the piano, or the cello, or whatever his fancy had settled on at that particular time – and had already decided what he was going to be when he grew up: Greville Foley, composer, he told them, matter-of-factly. He was constantly scribbling at little pieces of music he was creating and became impatient with his sister and Nella when Marianne alone showed any enthusiasm for being allowed to play these with him. All three girls were of course taught the piano as a necessary accomplishment for young ladies by Miss Osgood, but Marianne was the only one who persevered beyond practising scales and learning to play simple pieces.

Mrs Villiers had once hoped Francis would find his salvation in marrying again, but that hope soon perished, though salvation of a sort did come when Father Dorkings, growing more frail, managed to persuade Francis (though only Father Dorkings knew how) to assist him in the parish, acting as a sort of unofficial curate, until someone could be found to take the old rector's place so that he could retire. However, no other clergyman could be persuaded to accept a living where the rectory was occupied by someone else, and this unsatisfactory situation – to Eleanor at least – continued, though Francis gave no indication as to whether he found it so or not.

 

But all that was before the war. A war which had begun in some obscure corner of Europe and gathered momentum until it involved the whole world, changed the face of Europe and wiped out a whole generation of young men. Yet, even when it was over, after four long years, and peace had come at last, there was no question for the Wentworth family of returning to life as it had been…that life had ended abruptly, gone for ever, with a tragedy that had nothing to do with the war.

Life as they knew it had ended on that cataclysmic day at the beginning of August, in 1914, when the world was already swinging crazily round on its axis, out of control, as if it were the great lump of clay Joel Rafferty threw on his potter's wheel before getting it centred and shaping it into submission. Such a clamour, an upheaval, so many things happening at once. The country turning to preparations for war and all that entailed. The huge thunderstorm that night, like a prelude to the thunder that would presently roll over Europe. All of which had seemed at that time almost an irrelevance, shocking as that might seem now, of less importance then than the personal calamity which had altered the lives of the Wentworths for ever.

The day they had lost Marianne. The day the music stopped.

1914

But the world did not stop. Marianne had gone, for ever, but the world rumbled on, the war gathered momentum. And in the end there was no question, as far as Nella was concerned, of staying meekly at home while every young man of her acquaintance was marching off to war, eager to defend poor little Belgium from its arrogant invaders, the Germans, who had marched through neutral territory on their way to northern France and thus to Paris. Since she was prevented by her sex from beoming a soldier, she had done the next best thing and taken herself off to enlist as a VAD nurse. She had screwed up her hair, put on a severe felt hat ‘borrowed' from Florrie, and added years to her age in order to appear old enough to serve in France when she'd completed her training, and though she knew the doctor signing her up had not believed her, the shortage of nurses, plus her earnestness and determination, must have carried her through.

She began her training in a big London teaching hospital where she learnt that windows must be opened three inches during the day and two at night, and to straighten the castors of beds so that they were not a quarter of an inch out of line, that a speck of dust was a sin, to make hospital corners when tucking in the sheets, and to obey Sister at all times. She did not see a wounded soldier until troop trains arrived bringing the hundreds of wounded and dying men from the battlefield they called the Somme.

Enormous as the shock of this was, it did not prepare her for what she encountered when she was sent overseas to nurse the casualties there. 1916. Flanders. Plunged straight into the thick of it with her fellow nurses, there she had the first taste of what war really meant.

‘Dear Father, Grandy and Amy,

Well, here I am at last, on active service, after a seasick crossing over the Channel which I will not upset you by describing. I have been assigned to a camp hospital, comprising long lines of camouflaged marquees which serve as wards, with tarpaulin passages connecting them. I am billeted in a bell tent with my friend, Daisy Musgrave. (You remember her, my fellow VAD who trained with me in London.) It's all very military, but our tents are quickly becoming our home, with all our own things around us.

Like everyone else, I have brought too many clothes and personal possessions with me, though no doubt there will come a time when I shall be very glad to get out of uniform and into civvies for visiting the town when I'm off duty. Daisy has carted a gramophone with her everywhere, through thick and thin. She plays the latest dance music all the time and teaches me all the newest steps.

Don't worry about me – we are well fed and watched over and chaperoned within an inch of our lives. We thought the hospital rules in London were strict but that was nothing to what they are here!

To keep up the morale of the men, there are concerts and sing-songs which we nurses are graciously allowed to attend, and jollifications organised for the men who are well enough, often with soldier dancing comically with soldier at these, because nurses must not partner them. Nurses must not dance with other nurses, either…nurses must not wear their own fur collars around their necks to keep out the icy wind as they run from their tents to the wards…nurses must not, ever, consort in public with officers…nurses must be saints, not human beings. So you can see how difficult this must be for me!

I am lucky to be bunking up with Daisy. She's awfully nice, such fun and never grumbles, though this nurse's life she has chosen is harder for her than for most, since she comes from a very grand family, and has never before needed to lift a finger to help herself. (Unlike me, with a sensible grandmama who has always brought us up to be useful around the house; thank you, Grandy!) She is very pretty and has lovely thick fair hair which is a great trial to her and keeps slipping down because she's always had a maid to pin it up properly before. But she never minds when she has to do the jobs everyone hates, and she's better than anybody at keeping the boys' spirits up. They call her Sister Sunshine.

We VADs are all known to the Tommies as ‘sister', much to the fury of the pukka, qualified sisters, which must be galling for them, after all. Their rank is very important to them, after the years of training, hard work and little pay they've had to endure to reach it. They keep up their self-importance by ordering us about as if we were children, and not very intelligent ones at that, but we are used to this by now and most of them relent when they get to know us.
“
Your assistance is not without its drawbacks, Miss Wentworth,” was all Sister Johnson said to me when I dropped and broke a syringe the other day.'

In the letters home which Nella wrote for those Tommies who were not able to write for themselves, they spoke jokingly of the rain, rain, rain, which would not drain away in this low-lying land, and played down how it filled with mud the bomb craters, and the overflowing trenches they were compelled to fight in; they did not mention that men, guns and horses were regularly drowned in the thick ooze, and did not speak of the horrific wounds and the deaths of their comrades; nor of the stink of death and corruption from unclaimed, unburied bodies, and the latrines which could be smelt half a mile away.

And neither did Nella mention the shock which had awaited her and her fellow volunteers. She was only one of the many young, half-trained girls, for the most part gently raised, living previously sheltered lives, most of whom had never even seen a half-dressed man before, never mind a naked male body. Having to do for them the intimate things which might help them to survive, nursing the sick and wounded in improvised, primitive and often filthy conditions which would have horrified the strict training hospitals they had so recently left. Cutting off mud-caked uniforms before they should set like cement, in order to tend stinking, gangrenous wounds and horrifying internal injuries, dressing the stumps of limbs lost by red-hot shrapnel, which could slice through an arm or a leg as easily as a piece of spaghetti; it all became second nature.

‘But I've left my best bit of news until last,'
she had concluded that first letter.
‘Grev is working here, too! Can you imagine how astonished we both were – me, especially? He was the last person I expected to see.'

In one of those happenings which are called coincidences, but which happened all the time in the random chaos of this war, she and Greville Foley had found themselves working in the same unit, she nursing and Grev as a non-combatant stretcher-bearer, a job which earned the respect of everyone, since it meant plunging out into no-man's-land in the thick of enemy fire to bring back the wounded and dying. Unarmed, not trained to use weapons or handle ammunition, their only defence a white brassard, or armband, with a scarlet cross on it.