Fourpenny Flyer (28 page)

He was touched by her furious inability to find a suitable threat. ‘Oh what will you do, you beautiful creature?' he said, teasing her with laughter. It was a great mistake.

‘I will not marry you,' she said stamping her foot.

‘Tilda!' he implored. ‘I beg you!'

But Claude was opening the door and he and Mrs Honeywood were bustling into the room and their argument was abruptly curtailed.

Matilda turned her body away from him, walking across to her mother, and for the rest of the evening she kept herself aloof, sitting as far away from him as she could, talking to other people and never to him and, finally, when the carriage came to collect them all at the end of the performance, saying goodbye as though he were the slightest acquaintance.

‘You will recall what I vowed, I daresay,' she said coolly, ‘and what is to be done if we are to resume our friendship.'

‘Tilda!' he begged. ‘You don't mean it.'

‘Oh indeed I do,' she said, and swept into the carriage, straight-spined with determination.

He was awake all night worrying about it. And when a letter was delivered early the next morning just after he arrived home from the stamping and sorting, his heart gave the most uncomfortable lurch at the sight of her furious handwriting. How had they come to such a pass, so suddenly and just at the very moment when he thought their futures settled and assured?

‘I hope you have reconsidered your decision to talk to your brother,' she wrote. ‘I do not wish to hurt you, dearest Billy. I have lain wakeful all night considering how I hurt you. I love you to distraction. Howsomever I do have a position to keep up.
Please
talk to your brother. Is that truly so much for your loving Tilda to ask?'

Put like that it seemed reasonable, if impossible. He wrote back to her at once.

‘I will do as you ask my love, this evening as ever is.

‘Your own devoted Billy.

‘PS I love you to distraction and beyond. I would do anything for you. You are my heart and soul.'

But doing this particular thing was going to be extraordinarily difficult.

He worried about it all through the day, making several uncharacteristic mistakes at the sorting, and growing steadily more and more irritable. By mid-afternoon, his underlings were glad to see the back of him.

He made it his business to travel home in the same carriage as his brother, but John was so withdrawn and thoughtful he wasn't even able to start a conversation with him, leave alone an argument, and he was still in this quiet mood when Nan came home, in a great rush as always, picking up the letters that had been left on the hall table for her attention, and ripping them open as she ran upstairs. One was from Annie, two were bills and the fourth was from Thomasina Callbeck.

‘You were right, Johnnie,' she said as she strode into the parlour, still reading. ‘Sir Osmond is engaged, and they don't like the lady. “Her name is Jane Bellingham, daughter to a manufacturer and prodigious rich.”'

‘Then she should suit,' Billy said.

‘Oh come now, Billy,' his brother laughed. ‘Daughter to a manufacturer? That's a deal too common for our precious Easters.'

‘Then what would they think of your intended?' Billy asked, seizing his opportunity.

‘Fortunately, they do not need to think of her at all, it being none of their affair.'

‘You are wrong as to that, Johnnie,' Nan said, ‘since Thomasina and Evelina are invited to your wedding.'

‘The Easter cousins?'

‘Indeed.'

‘Mama!' he said, enraged. ‘How could you when you
know my feelings on the matter?' Nothing had changed. He might be her manager of sales but she still gave no thought to his feelings at all. She didn't even bother to consult him.

‘I thought you'd ha' grown to more sense,' she said, riled by his anger.

‘But they are Easters!' Deuce take it, after all this time you'd have thought she'd have understood that.

‘So are you.'

‘I won't have it,' he said furiously. ‘You should have more pride.'

‘They are invited.'

‘Then you must write back and tell 'em they ain't welcome.'

‘I will do no such thing,' she said. ‘Have a care, boy! Remember who I am! 'Ten't for you to tell me who I'm to invite.'

‘I am not a child, Mama! I mean what I say.'

‘And so do I, Johnnie. So do I.'

‘I will not have an Easter at my wedding.'

‘They are Callbecks, you ridiculous boy,' glancing at Billy in the hope that he could say something witty to diffuse their temper.

‘They are cousins to the Easters,' John insisted.

‘And your Miss Sowerby is the daughter of a clerk,' Billy pointed out, taking the chance his mother had offered but not in the way she'd intended. ‘Had you thought of that?'

‘No,' John said turning to him coldly. ‘Why should I? Her parentage is of no consequence.'

‘It may not be of any consequence to you Johnnoh,' Billy said, ‘but 'tis a deuced nuisance to me and Matilda, I can tell 'ee.'

Now what? Nan thought. Is there no end to temper this evening? What is the matter with Billy?

‘It is none of your affair,' John said crossly, transferring his anger to his brother. ‘And if that stupid Matilda of yours –'

‘She ain't stupid! She's a fine girl. With a position to keep up.' Bristling.

‘Oh ho! I see what 'tis. She looks down on my Harriet, is that it?'

‘She could hardly help it,' Billy defended, ‘seeing your Harriet is only one step above a servant.'

‘And your Tilda one step above a fool. Devil take it, Billy, you shan't speak of my –'

‘I'll speak as I please. The truth hurts don't it, Johnnie? One step above a ser –'

‘Be quiet! Be quiet or I'll not be answerable for –'

They were like two fighting cocks, Nan thought, jumping at each other, shrieking defiance, hackles rising, hair bristling, red-faced and staring-eyed, her two dear boys, who'd always been so close.

‘Boys! Boys!' she cried. ‘Have done!'

But they were too far into their anger to hear her.

‘Your precious Matilda is a nasty little snob, let me tell 'ee.'

‘Your precious Miss Sowerby is a skivvy.'

There'll be fisticuffs, Nan thought, watching them with alarm and admiration. ‘If you continue,' she shouted. ‘You shall dine elsewhere, so you shall. Stop it at once! D'ye hear?'

But they went on screaming abuse at one another. ‘Deuce take it,' she said, as much to herself as to them, ‘I can't abide much more of this. Are we to scream our way through dinner, you poor fools? Is this the sort of behaviour I'm to expect from my sons?'

‘Snob!'

‘Skivvy!'

Nan picked up her letters and left them to fight it out. Short of lifting them up and carrying them out of the room, which was obviously and totally beyond her powers, there was nothing else she could do. There was no sense in either of them, and if they were going to break the furniture or crack one another's skulls she would rather not be there to see it. Blamed fools! She would go and dine with Mr Brougham, that's what she'd do. Dear, calm, cultivated, civilized Mr Brougham.

It was a fine October evening, which was just as well, for Nan had stormed out of the house in too much of a temper to wait for the carriage, although she'd snatched up her muff and crammed her bonnet on her head, before she slammed the door. She strode through Bedford Square, scowling with fury, her russet coat as bright as the plane leaves in the gardens, her black button-boots swishing against each other like scythes.

Above the shadowy shops of Holborn, the sky pulsed with colour, blood red, russet, orange and purple, smudged and veiled by the grey-brown smoke from the city's busy chimneys, but the streets below were dark and as yet unlit. She pushed through the crowds and crossed into Chancery Lane, walking more steadily now, eased by her exertions. And presently she came to the entrance to Lincoln's Inn, a great, competent, reassuring, red-brick gateway, built like a fortress with an impressive coat of arms carved above the cornerstone and twin towers on either side of the arch, judicially balanced the one against the other. The gas lights on either side of the arch were already lit, pale gold blooms against the sombre red brick, and the oak doors still stood open, but the archway to justice was as black as a coalmine.

She ran through it quickly into the garden. It was a beautifully kept garden and well laid out, with plenty of thick shrubbery, neat gravel paths, a long avenue of black poplars, and overlooking Lincoln's Inn Fields, an elevated terrace walk, dark and shadowy now but still peaceful and decidedly rural. A sweet, green, country place right in the middle of the city. It restored her to good humour just to
look at it.

The court itself was surrounded on three sides by tessellated towers and ancient Gothic windows, and it was lighter here than it had been in Chancery Lane, for lamps were lit both inside and outside the buildings. She could see the pale face of a clerk who was busily writing beside one of the windows immediately above her, and the brass plates were glowingly legible beside the entrances. She drew her hand out of her muff and ran her fingers down the brazen lists until she found the name she wanted: ‘Appleby, Brougham & Furnival'. Yes, she had done the right thing to come here.

Mr Frederick Brougham had just returned from court and was still wigged, gowned and weary when his servant came quietly into the room to announce that ‘a Mrs Nan Easter has arrived to see you sir,
without
appointment, sir'.

‘This is a lady who could never be constrained by appointments, Brandyman,' he said, smiling happily. ‘Show her up at once.'

She walked into his chambers like the leader of an invading army, disturbing the smell of ancient dust and old leather with a pungent combination of newsprint, horse-sweat and new warm wool. ‘My dear,' he said, holding out his hands in greeting. ‘To what do I owe this unexpected pleasure?'

‘My family's gone lunatic,' she said, beaming at him, brown eyes glistening with mischief, dark eyebrows arching like wings in flight, dark curls springing about her forehead as though they were growing before his eyes.

What vitality she has, he thought, removing his wig. ‘Well now, I'm sorry to hear that,' he said. ‘How may I be of service?'

‘You may feed me. I've left home in a temper and not eaten.'

‘It shall be done at once, if you will allow me to send Brandyman out on a few errands.' He'd been invited to dine with one of his colleagues that evening, so he would have to send excuses. ‘Would pigeon pie and porter serve?'

‘'Twould be capital.'

And so it was, tasty and peaceful, sitting at his little
round table beside the window, among his learned tomes and his neat papers, as the dusk rolled in from the gardens and somebody below them swept the courtyard, swish, swish, swish.

When the meal was done and Brandyman had removed the dishes and made up the fire, they sat one on each side of the hearth and talked, like an old country couple.

He said he was glad to see her in better humour.

‘Aye,' she agreed, ‘so I am. That's the difference food makes.'

‘And company too, I trust?' he teased.

‘It could be said. I've a deal too much company at home and that's a fact. A deal too much company and a deal too many troubles.'

‘A trouble shared?' he suggested, taking a taper from its pot on the mantelpiece and leaning forward to light it at the fire.

It was a new experience for Nan Easter to be offered help and advice. She was usually the one who gave both, being the undoubted head of family and business. She looked at him thoughtfully, weighing the situation. If he gave advice 'twas like to be sound, and he would put no pressure on her to accept it. ‘My sons fight like Kilkenny cats,' she said, deciding to confide in him, ‘my daughter is afraid her husband will be arrested for supporting rioters, if you ever heard of anything so ridiculous, and my cousins are like to be homeless in a month or two, if what they say is to be believed. And if that en't enough, trade is down for the fourth month in succession.'

‘Trouble enough in all conscience,' he said, lighting his pipe. ‘Which' – puff – ‘is the most serious' – puff – ‘would 'ee say?'

She lifted her muff from the back of the chair where she'd flung it when she first came in, and took Annie's letter out of the pocket. ‘If my son-in-law is like to be arrested then this is the matter of most urgency,' she said, handing it across to him. ‘'Tis from my daughter, Annie. Pray read it. She says there is a Hampden Club meets at the rectory every Thursday, and now some of 'em mean to fire a barn, and James, her husband, knows of it and cannot dissuade 'em.'

He read attentively. ‘Write back and advise her that giving house-room to such meetings is perfectly legal. It may not remain so should the present administration alter the statutes, but for the present there is no harm in it. Howsomever the matter of firing barns would be construed as riot, and your daughter and her husband would both be well advised to have no cognisance of it, however much they might sympathize with the perpetrators.'

‘The papers are full of riots,' Nan said. ‘Scarce a day goes by without a machine being broke or a rick fired or somesuch. But 'tis no wonder they break the law when 'tis the law keeps the price of corn so high. What else is there for them to do?'

‘We shall have that particular law repealed eventually,' he promised, ‘when my cousin and his colleagues prevail. Meantime I would strongly advise you to write some sort of warning to your daughter.'

‘'Twill be done,' she said. ‘'Tis sound advice.'

He nodded, puffing his pipe. ‘There are other problems which concern you, are there not?'