Eppie (72 page)

‘Admit,’ Hortence said.

Genevieve sneaked a look. A well-dressed man, his thinning
hair brushed over a bald patch, bowed over the hand of each daughter in turn. With
his other hand he held his lock in place to stop it from slipping. ‘I come with
admirable tidings. I have managed to take a lease on a house in Bath, ready for
your mother and your good selves to move into straightaway.’         

‘That is admirable news,’ Hortence answered. ‘I am tired of
this hateful household. It is so quiet. We rarely have any visitors.’

Permelia was less keen to remove from Gabriel. ‘Doctor
Burndread is adamant that mother should not be stirred.  We must be patient a
while longer I think, sister.’

‘Eppie!’  It was Martha shouting. ‘Where are you?’

Genevieve leapt from her place of concealment.

‘What a fright!’ Permelia exclaimed, embarrassed that
Genevieve had overheard their scheming words about Gabriel. ‘You fair took the
breath from my body. Huber-Percy, might I introduce Lady Genevieve du Quesne.’

Martha burst in. ‘There you are! Ella’s here!’

‘It is vulgar to appear in a hurry!’ Permelia cried as Genevieve
fled the room.

‘And it is vulgar of you to shout!’ Genevieve yelled back.

In the carriage yard stood the brewery wagon, Dusty tethered
behind.

Ella leapt from the wagon, and she and Genevieve fell into
one another’s arms, laughing in delight at being together. ‘My family were overwhelmed
to hear about your good fortune! I couldn’t miss this opportunity to come and see
you.’

Hearing the rumpus, Gabriel strode out to greet the
visitors. 

Dusty’s thick felt ears twitched under Dick’s stroking hand.
‘You’re a fine-looking girl.’

Genevieve pressed her cheek against the donkey’s neck,
revelling in the velvety softness of her fur. ‘I’ve missed you, Dusty.’

‘I went over to Mulberry Farm to fetch her back for you,’ Jonas
said. ‘I had the same trouble with her as I’d had with Cross-Eyes; I couldn’t
wean the barmy thing off the ale. While you were in Malstowe, George told me
that he was happy for Dusty to live out her days on his farm, thinking you was
never coming back.’

Ella blushed, seeing Dick smiling at her.

‘Dick, find a place for Dusty?’ Genevieve asked.

Dick touched his cap.  ‘Will do, yer ladyship.’ 

‘Nice, isn’t he!’ Genevieve said, as she and Ella watched
him lead Dusty away. ‘His name’s Dick Pebbleton.’ Enjoying the role of matchmaker
she called after him, ‘Dick, show Ella around the stables?  I’m sure she would
like to see Dusty settled in.’

Ella grinned back at Genevieve as she followed Dick.

Another wagon trundled up. ‘Sam!’ Genevieve picked up her
skirts and tore down the track to greet him. He looked the same as she
remembered, though his hair, like Martha’s, was greying.

Sam had already paid a few calls to Tunnygrave Manor, on one
occasion with his brother Lewis.

Directly upon his return from Malstowe, Gabriel had engaged
a barrister on Sam’s behalf, the outcome of which was that he would not have to
return to jail.

When Mr Grimley visited Sam and Lewis at their farmstead, Sam
had recognised him as the mysterious gentleman whom he had seen in Squire
Bulwar’s study on that fateful day when he had been arrested by the magistrate’s
men.

One morning, whilst Genevieve and the others were taking tea
in the drawing room, Mr Grimley said he’d guessed all along that Thurstan knew Rowan
and Dawkin were the Bulwar’s great-grandchildren. That was the reason why
Thurstan had made pretence that Dawkin had killed Squire Bulwar. It was an
excuse to have him thrown into jail, and ultimately hung.   

It was now Genevieve’s turn to rush around, shouting for
Martha.

Smelling of coal-tar disinfectant, she emerged from the
scullery, where she had been helping a maid scrub stone shelves. Nervously, she
wrung her hands in her apron. By the look on Martha’s face, Genevieve knew that
her heart turned over at the sight of Sam.

‘Do you recall that time at The Leaking Barrel when Dawkin
walked in?’ Martha had asked Genevieve on the first day Sam visited the manor.
‘I was startled because I thought him so alike to Sam. Now I understand why.’

Sam slapped the basket-hamper in his cart. ‘Tis a grand mornin’,
Mrs D. How’s about we spend some time by the river? Lottie, Betsy? You’re more
than welcome, too. I’ve brought plenty to eat and a heap of blankets to sit
upon.’

Martha patted her hair-bun into a state of tidiness. ‘I
can’t think of anything we’d rather do on such a pleasant day.’

‘Eppie, are you coming?’ Sam asked.

Gabriel answered for her. ‘I’m afraid that Genevieve and I
have promised to entertain the Wexcombes.’

‘I believe that mam loved Sam from the moment she set eyes
on him,’ Genevieve said as she and Gabriel watched them drive off.

Together they wandered past the shuttered windows of the
dairy, and stepped onto the lawn.

Attempting to catch a butterfly, Permelia dashed around
bushes, wielding a net in a haphazard manner. 

‘Doesn’t she know how cruel that is?’ Genevieve muttered crossly.
‘She’ll break its wings.’

‘I dare say it hasn’t occurred to her, or if it has she
doesn’t care. Tell me, there’s something worrying you isn’t there?’

‘Whilst I was working at the mill I yearned to come home to
Little Lubbock. Now I am here I find I cannot forget how intolerable life is
for the poor. What is more, I do not
want
to forget. I feel driven to do
something to help them. Added to that, I feel such a blunderer. Each day I wake
with the good intention of not saying the wrong thing to the Wexcombes. I
always tell myself to act in a way which will not offend them. It never works.’

‘It is me who should apologise. This situation is entirely of
my own making. I should never have invited them here. But why should you have
to put away who you truly are? Be yourself.’ He laughed fondly. ‘You must find
your own way to happiness, my darling sister. I put nothing in your way.’

‘Rain, rain, rain, that’s all we’ve
had for days, almost non-stop.’ Genevieve gazed at a maple tree. Though a
thrush flew to its branches, the closed drawing room windows muffled its song.

‘Reuben Shaw won’t be happy,’ Gabriel said. ‘When I met him
in Litcombe last week he told me he’d bought a narrowboat and set up business
for the carriage of goods. The towpath will be a morass of sticky clay,
difficult for his horse to traverse.’ 

Clutching her embroidery, Hortence flounced in. She glanced
disdainfully at Martha, who sat knitting gloves for Sam. ‘Entertaining the
servants again, are we?’

Genevieve opened her mouth to answer back. Martha raised a
finger to her lips, indicating that she should ignore Hortence’s bitter words.

Despite the rain it felt humid. Flies buzzed and bumped under
the ceiling.

‘I’m sick of spending long hours in this room,’ Genevieve
said, gazing at the sickly lime-green paper adorned with idealistic pastoral
scenes. ‘There’s no air in here.’

‘Air?’ Lady Wexcombe said. ‘What a frightful idea!  Who
needs air?  Whenever I step out of doors the only air I smell arises from
farmyard unmentionables.’  She turned to Gabriel, who was reading a newspaper.
‘My daughters and I are most grateful for your hospitality, sir, though I fear
we must not trespass on your kindness any longer.’ 

‘I am delighted for you to stay as long as you desire.’
Almost as though he sensed Genevieve’s eyes fixed on him, he glanced at her,
grimacing slightly from the untruth.

‘Besides, we must stay for the ball,’ Hortence reminded her
mother. She poked a finger through the birdcage, trying to prod the forlorn
linnet. ‘This pathetic bag of feathers still refuses to sing.’

‘He needs to be set free,’ Genevieve implored.

‘Such an idiotic notion,’ Hortence said. ‘Why would she
choose to fly in this rain?’

Despairing at being unable to reason with Hortence, Genevieve
took up her silks. It was tedious embroidering the fine shawl, but there wasn’t
much else to do to pass the time.

‘What ugly hands you have,’ Permelia said. She added a touch
more grey to her watercolour of storm clouds. ‘Many a beau has worshiped my
slender hands.’

Genevieve had thought herself elegant in her grass-green
frock embellished with red flowers. Now she felt sullied by Permelia’s
throwaway comment.

Rain battered the windows.

‘How I yearn for a sunny morning, then I could ride out,’ Permelia
said.

‘When the sun deems to show its face, why do you not
accompany Permelia riding, sir?’ Lady Wexcombe asked. ‘I am sure my daughter
would value your company.’

Hesitantly, Gabriel responded, ‘It would be an honour, my
lady.’

Hortence turned to Genevieve. ‘I forgot to mention, this
morning, whilst the girl was dressing my hair before the glass … ’

‘Folk shun’t spend too much time before a looking-glass,’
Betsy said, ‘lest they spy the devil ‘issen.’ 

Hortence frowned at this interruption. ‘… a mouse ran across
my feet. In my consternation I dropped your mother’s silver hand-glass. It
smashed on the floor.’

‘Thar portends the loss of a loved one in the house.’ Betsy
rubbed a black snail over the wart on her nose. To complete the charm she impaled
the snail on the point of a blackthorn twig.

‘I do believe, Mrs Psalter, that you are trying your utmost
to enrage my daughters and I with your native paganism, your tedious omens,’
Lady Wexcombe said.

‘I am of faerie descent, so I knows a thing or three. I gave
the same warning to Gillow when I got them corns on me feet, an’ I was proved
right.’

‘And who might this Gillow be?’ Lady Wexcombe asked.

‘He was my …,’  Genevieve faltered, ‘someone close to me.’

‘He was my husband,’ Martha said.  ‘He was shot by Eppie’s
father.’

‘Shot? How so?’

‘There was an incident. My son and his lordship argued.
Gillow was caught in the middle.’

‘Your husband was a fool to intervene.’

‘If he had not, my son would have died.’

‘By whom you mean that
scoundrel who stole Lady Genevieve from her cradle?  More is the pity that his
lordship did not kill both of them with one bullet.’

A few days later the weather improved sufficiently for
Gabriel and Permelia to ride out.

Genevieve had overheard Lady Wexcombe telling Permelia that,
as she was such an attractive and amiable young woman, it would not be long
before Gabriel took her for his wife. Though she knew Gabriel ventured out
unwillingly, Genevieve feared that he might succumb to Permelia’s ardent
advances.

To take her mind off her melancholic thoughts, she passed
through the garden gate and headed into the woods. Birds hopped and played, a chorus
of a hundred blended notes arising from every tree, shrub and briar thicket.

Settling beside Shivering Falls, she watched the waterfall and
listened to it roaring over mossy stones, pounding rhythmically into the plunge
pool.

Like a hidden hand, the beauty of nature caressed and eased
her mind, drawing her back to her childhood memories. Never was she truly alone;
always Talia was her companion, her ghostly form mingling with the stars of
sunlight glittering on the cascade.

Content in her isolation
beneath the shade of an alder tree, Genevieve took up her book,
The Romance
of the Forest.

Genevieve, Permelia and Lady Wexcombe sat around a green
baize table in the salon, playing cards. Genevieve always kept a book open on
her lap for the tiresome interludes.

‘Genevieve reads incessantly, firm in the belief that
improvement to her mind will be accomplished by extensive reading,’ Permelia
said patronisingly.

Seated before the pianoforte, Hortence restlessly flicked
through sheet music. ‘I believe her mind to be in vast need of improvement.’

‘That was a bad move,’ Permelia told Genevieve.

‘I haven’t the heart to play no more.’ Genevieve was tired
of the sisters speaking about her as though she were not in the room. Seeing
Betsy draw her woollen shawl around her shoulders, she added a log to the fire
to keep the chill from her old friend’s bones.

‘Surely the servants are capable of such mediocre tasks?’ Hortence
chided.

‘Dawkin once told me about when he first went to work as a
climbing-boy for Mr Crowe. He breathed in so much soot that it killed the worms
in his stomach. After he retched them up he found one longer than the soot
cellar.’

Spread upon the hearth was a dusting of soot. With her
fingertip, she formed the letters DS. ‘I wonder where he is. What happened to
him?’

‘I’ll do a spot of fire divination for you, if you like?’
Betsy offered. 

‘You can foretell the future by seeing pictures in the
fire?’ Genevieve asked, surprised.   

‘Would anyone care for another game?’ Lady Wexcombe asked. ‘Gabriel,
I am sure that you can drag yourself away from your chronicle, just this once.’

‘Tea and cakes?’ Genevieve asked Betsy.

‘Lovely, m’dear, t’ud slide down a treat.’

Genevieve tugged the ribbon beside the fire, and went to sit
beside Martha on the settee. Soon, Duncan arrived carrying a tray laden with
refreshments.

‘It’s heavenly to sup a decent cup of tea,’ Martha said. ‘Mr
Loomp’s tea leaves had no flavour. I always suspected they’d been used before.’

Genevieve cast her mind back to the wreckers at the mill and
thought of the truck store manager languishing in jail. ‘The only way that we
could make our drinks look the colour of tea was by pouring hot water over the
leaves and adding charcoal from burnt bread crusts.’

‘I never liked Mr Loomp’s bread,’ Martha reflected. ‘It
always tasted gritty, as though it had sand in it.’