More Tales of the West Riding (6 page)

“What are you two shouting at each other about?” said Joshua disagreeably, entering.

“She says she won't have Lucy as one of her bridesmaids,” said Ada, timid.

“Yes, you will.”

“No, father, I won't. Why should I have my wedding spoilt by Lucy, with her superior airs?”

“Kate, you must have Lucy. Her mother would never forgive me, otherwise.”

“Father,” said Kate, stretching her face, crimson with rage, stiffly towards him: “I am your daughter and I like my own way as much as you do. I will not have my wedding spoiled by Lucy.”

“How could she spoil it?”

“Just by being there. I'll be married in a registrar's office and have no bridesmaids at all, sooner than have Lucy.”

“And what will Ben say to that?”

“Ben will do what I wish.”

“That remains to be seen, my girl. Ben's a tougher nut than you think.”

“Ha!” cried Kate, and laughing and tossing her head scornfully, she ran from the room.

“You'll have to give in to her, Joshua, or the whole thing might break down.”

“But what shall I say to Tom?”

“That's your look-out. It's a nuisance, though, for I was hoping Lucy would write out the invitations for us.”

“Well, she won't. … Tom,” said Joshua in a diffident and apologetic tone very different from that of his usual orders, next day: “It seems your daughter and mine have quarrelled.”

“Quarrelled?”

“Kate doesn't want to have Lucy as one of her bridesmaids.”

“What!”

“I'm as vexed about it as you are, Tom, but there it is. She's an obstinate piece, is our Kate.”

“She's
your
daughter.”

“Aye. That's the way of it.”

“In view of everything, you won't expect us to come to the wedding, then,” said Hallam quietly.

As he was not a Milner, he did not shout or stamp. But his face was pale, his hands quivered; his tone was like ice.

“But what else could you do, Tom, for heaven's sake?” queried Joshua uneasy.

“We shall go to Blackpool for the day,” said Hallam drily.

This insultingly commonplace solution was received with tears of fury in Number 3. Mrs Hallam wanted to rush down to Milne Thorpe and, as she said, “have it out” with her brother. But her husband forbade this, and when Thomas Hallam put down his quiet foot, it stayed down. On this occasion, his daughter approved his decision.

“I don't care a button for Kate's wedding,” she said cheerfully—lying, of course. “I don't like the Milners
or
the Cloughs. It's sure to be a thoroughly vulgar affair.”

Unfortunately, however, as with a stone thrown into a pond, there were further ripples.

“This is a bad do about Lucy, Edward,” said Ben seriously to his friend.

“It's a very bad do. Couldn't you persuade Kate—”

“No. Marrying Kate takes some doing, I can tell you. She's very spirited.”

“Like her father.”

“Well, yes. Of course when we're married, it'll be different.”

Edward doubted this, but did not say so.

“Edward, couldn't you persuade Lucy...”

“No! It's an insult to her to suggest it. By the way, Ben,” said Edward sadly: “I don't know if you're thinking of me being your best man—”

“Of course I am.”

“Well, I can't do it.”

“What!”

“I can't do it. Lucy would never get over it.” He hesitated and added in a low tone: “I love Lucy, you see.”

Ben groaned. “This is awful, awful! Perhaps time will heal it all,” he suggested despairingly.

“I doubt it. Lucy's a Milner too, you know. And I may as well tell you now, Ben,” went on Edward uncomfortably: “that it's no use my staying on at Clough Mills. Kate would always have her knife into me—and she'll be your wife, you know.”

“But what will you do if you leave us, Edward?”

“I've got a chance to go into partnership with a man up the valley,” said Edward. “Old Jeremiah Sykes. His son's just died, so he's anxious to get somebody into the firm. Terms are quite good—considering.”

“I can't bear it, Edward.”

“No, I can't either. But there it is. When you fall in love, you're done for.”

“That is so.”

“Well—goodbye, Ben.”

“Goodbye, lad.”

They shook hands and parted.

Ten years later, Lucy was walking down one of the main residential roads into Annotsfield, her two young sons at her side, when she encountered, for the first time since their marriages, her cousin Kate.

It happened in this way. Lucy had been to visit Edward's mother, old Mrs Randal. She was even now rebuking herself for feeling disappointed to find the old lady in good health, recovered from a slight recent influenza. Mrs Randal is a sweet person, Lucy told herself sternly; Edward inherits much of his kind disposition from his mother; of course I don't want her to die. (All the same, it would take some of the burden from Edward's shoulders. No! Perish the thought.) This long highly respectable terrace of middle-class
houses was just beginning to be invaded by professional men—a noted surgeon, a fashionable dentist—who enjoyed the solid houses with their long narrow gardens stretching down towards the pavement, terminating in a scrolled ironwork gate and two or three well-built steps.

Lucy's elder son, Edward always called Ned, a tall slim dark-eyed boy very like his father in spirit as well as physique, being mild, firm and courteous, walked sedately at her side. Harry, the younger, resembled his mother, being red-haired, blue-eyed, sparkling and rather naughty; he was being slightly naughty as usual. The steps excited him, and presently he snatched his hand from Lucy's and ran off to them. He seated himself proudly on each top step as he encountered it, to the sad detriment of his white home-made sailor suit, then jumping up with a ringing laugh sprang down to the pavement. Unfortunately the steps, though they remained few in number, increased in depth with the gradient of the terrace.

“He'll fall, Mother,” observed Ned mildly.

Lucy sighed. Why was Harry always so
naughty?
The soiling of the sailor suit, washed and ironed only yesterday, was bad enough, but the ridicule of the boy's performance in the eyes of all Annotsfield—passers-by were actually laughing—vexed Lucy's proud spirit. She took a step forward, intending to pursue the naughty but dearly loved boy, remembered that it was not wise for her to run, since she was pregnant with her third child (me), and instead urged her elder son:

“Stop him, Ned.”

Ned obediently rushed after his brother.

Too late, alas. Harry, leaping down yet another pair of steps, miscalculated their depth, tripped and fell. Never slow to express his feelings, he howled. A lady in an elegantly cut walking dress of fine indigo worsted—trust Lucy to perceive its quality—with a handsome cameo brooch and a superlative
hat of spiky dark blue satin bows, was moving with dignity down the dentist's long path. She hastened her step, tucked her silver-cornered purse under one arm and lifted Harry to his feet. Lucy, hastening her steps as much as she dared, cried: “Thank you!” in mingled gratitude and resentment, and found herself face to face with her cousin.

“Lucy!”

“Kate!”

“We have not seen each other for a long time, Lucy.” Kate's voice was dry, but shook.

“We live up the valley now, I don't often come into Annotsfield,” panted Lucy.

“Why should we not be friends now, Lucy. All that old quarrel is over long ago. It was foolish. No doubt I was to blame. I was young. Let us be friends now, Lucy. You have two fine boys. I too have a son.”

She looked towards the road. An open landau drawn by a fine chestnut horse and driven by a coachman in dark green livery, with a cockade in his hat, stood at the kerb. In it sat a boy. A year older than Ned, probably; fairish and solid, scowling a little but bright-eyed.

“The image,” thought Lucy, “of his father, I don't doubt.”

At this moment there uncurled itself from beneath the hind wheels of the landau, a dog. A huge, tall, sleek, smooth white Dalmatian, its sinewy body neatly spotted here and there in black. It came slowly towards Kate, stepping delicately, holding its long tapering tail stiffly aloof. Another similar animal followed. These “coach dogs”, as they were then called, were at that time regarded in Annotsfield as the summit token, the very hallmark, of wealth.

“Let us be friends now, Lucy,” Kate was murmuring.

But the Dalmatian was the last straw.

“No!” cried Lucy. “Never! You made me bitterly unhappy in my young time, Kate. I am happy now. Don't come and spoil it all. I don't want you now.”

“True We do not need each other now,” said Kate, very quiet and cold. She smiled, nodded, and moved away towards her carriage.

In fact, both women lied.

Lucy was a happy wife, loving and loved. Her sons were healthy. Edward, at her appeal, had given up playing rugby after losing a few teeth in a scrum, and settled down to be a steady married man. Her mother was never ill. Her beloved father had lately been showing some deterioration in heart and chest, but not more than was to be expected in a man of his age; his wife nursed him very precisely, and suitable specialists called in gave only mild and distant warnings. (They were wrong there, as it turned out, for Thomas Hallam died a few years after I was born, living just long enough to let me know him.) But Lucy was not yet worried by this possibility; being strong physically herself, she was not apt to foresee ill-health. No; the only thing that worried her was the state of the textile trade, which at that time was going up and down in prosperity as usual. Or rather, perhaps—to be honest—there were two things that worried her; the state of the textile trade, and Edward's lack of skill with money.

Everybody in the West Riding knew that Edward Randal was highly skilled as regards cloth. Oh yes, he knew cloth thoroughly, fleece to worsted. And was honest—almost too honest for his own good. But money bored him. Of a careless, generous disposition, somehow he could not
bother
with money. As long as old Sykes lived, all was well; Edward found the old man tiresome, finicking, pernickety, fussy, and hated the scoldings he gave his young partner every month. But everything was correct and in order. Edward and Lucy lived in a small but comfortable house in the village up the valley from Annotsfield. The hills, rocky, steep, purple with heather in autumn, towered around them and the young
couple walked them eagerly; the rocky beck sparkled at the bottom of the field. They were not rich, but not poor; their income was steady, for old Sykes paid Edward a salary; the children were all one could wish.

But then old Sykes died. Edward was left to manage the firm. He enjoyed being his own master. But now not only his wife and children, his mother and one still unmarried sister, but old Sykes' widow and unmarried daughter, depended on his skill.

Then came the awful incident of the closed drawer. Ned was three months old when it occurred. A man from the village came to the door one afternoon to bring some raspberry canes ordered by Edward. Not having quite enough loose cash to pay him, and Edward being not yet returned from the mill, Lucy skipped blithely across the room to Edward's desk, where she often saw him inserting and removing papers. She pulled open the relevant drawer. It was full of unpaid bills.

Lucy, horrified, white and gasping, sank to a chair. Her face was so terrible that Baby Ned, frightened, set up a long loud howl. Lucy with some skill used this outburst as an excuse. Joggling Ned to ensure that his wail continued, she urged the raspberry man to call at the mill for his payment since Baby was in such a trying mood.

The scene between Lucy and Edward on Edward's return home was extremely painful. Lucy, daughter of a meticulously honest Hallam, sobbed and demanded to know how Ned's father could disgrace Ned so. Edward, bitterly ashamed, wept too, but somehow conveyed without uttering it his conviction that he never could manage money. Accounts, he said, were a torture no cloth man could endure. He did not, to be truthful, really understand them.

“At Cloughs' I never had anything to do with money,” he lamented.

From that moment the Randal household never ran up a
bill. Lucy never bought anything she could not immediately pay for. She economised, she scraped; she did her own housework, she made her own dresses; she stitched the boys' sailor suits herself. So far, so good. The household was free of the slightest reproach. But what about the mill? Once, things grew so muddled there that she actually had to turn to her father for help.

“Ought you help Edward, Tom? Will he ever keep everything straight? Think of ourselves a bit, will you?” objected Hannah as they went to bed that night.

“I encouraged Edward to marry Lucy, so I must stand by it,” returned Hallam, calm as usual.

“Well—”

“Edward is just a bit too soft, that's all. He's as honest as the day, but a bit too soft.”

“I agree. But—”

“And nobody could be a better husband to our daughter.”

“Well, that's true,” yielded Hannah, warming a little.

“Or a better father to our grandchildren.”

“Ha!” exclaimed Hannah, rolling over to smother her vexation. “The children are certainly lovely.”

“Well, then.”

“Very well, but don't land us in the poorhouse in our old age.”

‘I won't. Hannah,” began Hallam very quietly: “I intend to Buy that house they live in, Edgecote, and put the deeds in Lucy's name. Then they'll always have a roof over their heads.”

“That's good, Tom, that's good. Yes, it's a good idea, is that. But don't ever tell Edward or Lucy, or those deeds will be in the bank as security for some overdraft of Edward's, before you know where you are.”