The Caxley Chronicles (44 page)

Edward promised to be discreet, kissed his mother good-bye and drove back to London well content.

The next few weeks were unusually busy for Edward, and it was early December before the trip northwards could be arranged.

The clearing-up process at the factory was going well, but Edward was to remain one of the directors and there were a number of legal matters to arrange. Every other weekend he spent at Caxley, studying the business, and going through the accounts and staff arrangements with Kathy and John Bush. It was clear that they longed to hand over the responsibilities of the shop and restaurant which they had so bravely borne, and Edward hoped to move back to his own house as soon as the tenants in the floors below could find alternative accommodation. John Bush had been offered the little cottage where Edward and Joan had been born. A daughter, recently widowed, was to share it with him, and the old man made no secret of looking forward now to complete retirement.

Maisie was in her element choosing papers for the walls and material for curtains and covers. She went with Winnie to one or two furniture sales and acquired some fine pieces. Old Mrs North gave her the tea service which had graced her own table at the house in the market square, and Maisie liked to think of it in its own home again.

At the end of November she was delighted to discover that she was to have a baby in the early summer.

'We
must
get in before long,' she implored Edward. 'I
must get everything ready for it while I'm still mobile.'

The family was as pleased as they were themselves at the news, and Mrs North's comment amused them all.

'At last,' she cried, 'we'll have a
christening
at St Peter's. Don't tell me you've anything against that?'

She was reassured, and set to work to knit half a dozen first-size vests with enthusiasm.

Edward set out alone on his journey, starting very early, as he wanted to make the return trip in the day.

It was cold and overcast when he set out, and rain began to fall heavily after an hour or so on the road. He had looked forward to this visit, but now a certain depression invaded him, due in part to the dismal weather and to general fatigue. Although he had made up his mind to return to the market square and to take up the duties laid upon him by Sep, he still had moments of doubt.

True, as Maisie had said, running one business was very like running another, but he was going to miss his trips abroad and his growing skill in designing. Life in London had been pleasant. Would he find Caxley too parochial after wider horizons? He could only hope that he was doing the right thing. In any case the thought of the baby being born in Caxley gave him enormous pleasure, and he looked forward to introducing it to all the varied delights of the Cax running through the garden.

He reached the town where his father lived a little before noon. Rain slashed against the side windows, and passing vehicles sent up showers of water across the windscreen. Wet grey-slated roofs and drab houses stretched desolately in all
directions. Bedraggled people, bent behind dripping umbrellas, looked as wretched as their surroundings. Edward drove through the centre of the town and followed the route which his father's last letter had given.

He found the road, the house, switched off the car's engine and sat looking about him. It was less gloomy than parts of the town he had just traversed, but pretty dispiriting, nevertheless. The houses were semi-detached, and built, Edward guessed, sometime in the thirties. They were brick below and pebble-dash above, each having an arched porch with a red-tiled floor to it. The front gardens, now leafless, were very small. Here and there a wispy ornamental cherry tree, or an etiolated rowan, struggled for existence in the teeth of the winds which came from the North Sea.

The sharp air took his breath away as he made his way to the door. It was opened so quickly that Edward felt sure that his arrival had been watched. A plump breathless woman of middle-age greeted him with an air of excitement. She wore a flowered overall and carried a duster.

'Come to see your dad?' she greeted him. 'He's been waiting for you. Come in. You must be shrammed.'

Edward, who had never heard this attractive word, supposed, rightly, that it meant that he must be cold, and followed her into the small hall. An overpowering smell of floor polish pervaded the house and everything which could be burnished, from brass stair rods to the chain of the cuckoo clock on the wall, gleamed on every side.

The door on the right opened and there stood a slight figure, taller than Sep, but less tall than Edward, gazing at him with the bright dark eyes of the Howards.

'Your son's come,' announced the woman. The words dropped into the sudden silence like pebbles into a still pool.

'Come in, my boy,' said Leslie quietly, and they went into the sitting-room together.

The meeting had stirred Edward deeply, and for a moment or two he could find nothing to say. His father was fumbling at the catch of a cupboard.

'Like a drink?'

'Thank you.'

'Whisky, sherry or beer?'

'Sherry, please.'

Edward watched his father pouring the liquid. He was very like Aunt Kathy. His hair was still thick, but now more grey than black. He had the same dark, rather highly arched, eyebrows, and the pronounced lines from nose to the corner of the upper lip which all the Howards seemed to have inherited from Sep. He was dressed in a tweed suit, warm but shabby, and his shirt was so dazzlingly white that Edward felt sure that his landlady attended to his linen.

The room was over-filled with large furniture and innumerous knick-knacks, but a good fire warmed all, and old-fashioned red wallpaper, overpowering in normal circumstances, gave some cheer on a morning as bleak as this.

'You seem very comfortable here,' ventured Edward, glass in hand.

'They're good people,' said Leslie. 'He's a railway man, due to retire soon. I have two rooms. I sold up when the wife died. Came up here from the west country, and took a job with a car firm.'

'Are you still with them?' asked Edward.

'No,' replied Leslie briefly. 'Tell me about the family.'

Edward told him all that he could. He appeared quite unaffected by Robert's tragic end and his father's recent death, but Edward noticed that mention of his mother brought a smile.

'But she won't see me, eh?'

'I'm afraid not. I hope you won't try.'

'Don't worry. I treated her badly. Can't blame her for giving me the cold shoulder now. I shan't come to Caxley. I thought of it when I read of the old man's death, but decided against it. If there were any pickings I reckoned Lovejoy would let me know.'

There was something so casually callous about this last utterance, that Edward stiffened.

'Did you imagine that there would be?' he enquired. There must have been an edge to his tone, for the older man shot him a quick glance.

'Can't say I did, but hope springs eternal, you know.'

He placed his glass carefully on the table beside him, and turned to face Edward.

'This looks like the only time I'll be able to put my side of the story, so I may as well tell it now. You knew my father well enough, I know, but only as an older man when he'd mellowed a bit. When Jim and I were boys he was too dam' strict by half. Chapel three times on Sundays and Lord knows how many Bible meetings of one sort or another during the week. Jim stuck it all better than I did—and then, as we got older, he didn't have the same eye for the girls as I had. He was more like Dad—I was like Mum. I don't think I ever loved my father. He said "No" too often.'

'But I know he was fond of all his children,'broke in Edward.

'Had a funny way of showing it,' observed his father bitterly. 'He drove me to deceit, and that's the truth. He was a narrow-minded bigoted old fool bent on getting to heaven at any cost. I can't forgive him.' He was breathing heavily.

'He was also brave, honest and generous,' said Edward levelly. His father seemed not to hear.

'And he poisoned Winnie's mind against me later. There was no hope of reconciliation while Father was alive.'

'That's not true,' said Edward, anger rising in him. 'My mother's mind was made up from the moment you parted!'

'Maybe,' replied Leslie indifferently. 'She was a North—as obstinate as her old man.' He laughed suddenly, and his face was transformed. Now Edward could see why Leslie Howard was remembered in Caxley as a charmer.

'Don't let's squabble,' he pleaded. 'We've a lot to talk over. Let's come out to a pub I know for our grub. Mrs Jones here is a dab hand with house-cleaning but her cooking's of the baked-cod-and-flaked-rice variety. I told her we'd go out.'

Edward was secretly sorry to leave the good fire and overstuffed armchair, but dutifully drove through the relentless rain to a small public house situated two or three miles away on a windswept plain. Over an excellent mixed grill Edward learnt a little more of his father's life.

'My boy was killed in France,' said Leslie, 'and the girl is married and out in Australia'.

It was queer, thought Edward, to hear of this half-brother and sister whom he had never seen. His father spoke of them with affection. Naturally, they were closer to him than he and Joan could ever have been.

'And then Ellen was ill for so long—three or four years,
before she died. I got to hate that place in Devon. We had a garage there, you know. Dam' hard work and mighty little return for it.'

'What happened to it?' asked Edward.

'Sold everything up when Ellen went. Paid my debts—and they were plenty—and found this place. I wanted a change, and besides, the doctor told me to live somewhere flat. I've got a dicky heart. Same thing that took off my poor mum, I daresay.'

Gradually, Edward began to see the kind of life which was now his father's lot. He had fallen out with the car firm. It was obvious that he disliked being an employee after running his own business. It was also plain to Edward that if he did not have some regular employment he would very soon drift into a pointless existence in which drink would play a major part. Nevertheless, it seemed that there were grounds for believing that he had some heart complaint. The woman behind the bar, who seemed to be an old friend, had enquired about 'his attacks' with some concern, and both his parents had suffered from heart trouble.

For the past week he had been without work for the first time. He had heard of two book-keeping jobs in local firms and proposed to apply for them. Edward thought it sounded hopeful. As far as he could gather, his father's financial resources consisted of fifty pounds or so in the bank. This amount would not last long even in such modest lodgings as Mrs Jones'. This urgency to earn was a spur in the right direction, Edward surmised.

He paid the bill and drove his father home. The matter which had been uppermost in his mind was more complicated than he had first thought. He was determined to see that his
father was not in want. Now that he had met him he was equally sure that this was not the time to offer financial help. If he did, the chances of Leslie's helping himself grew considerably slighter. Prudently, Edward postponed a decision, but made his father promise to let him know the outcome of his job-hunting.

'I'll write to you in a week or so,' said Leslie as they parted. 'I don't suppose we'll meet again, my boy. Better to make this the last time, I think. It was good of you to make the journey. Tell those who are interested how I am. I've got a soft spot for old Bertie. I wonder if he ever regretted marrying a Howard?'

'Never,' said Edward stoutly, driving off, and left his father laughing.

Driving back along the wet roads Edward pondered on the day's encounter. He was satisfied now that he had seen his father. He was well looked after, in fairly good health, and obviously as happy as he would be anywhere.

As soon as heard that he was in work again he would make adequate provision against the future. He wanted to feel that there was a sum in the bank which would be available if the old man fell on hard times. But he must have a job—no matter how small the return—which would keep him actively occupied. His father's worst enemy, Edward saw, was himself. Too much solitude would breed self-pity and self-indulgence. He could see why Sep had never had much time for him. There was a streak of weakness which Sep would never have been able to understand or forgive.

'A rum lot, the Howards!' said Edward aloud, and putting his foot down on the accelerator, sped home.

E
DWARD FOUND
a surprising lack of interest in Leslie's welfare among the family. Aunt Kathy was perfunctory in her enquiries. His mother refused to discuss the matter. Maisie, naturally enough, was only vaguely interested in someone she had never met. Uncle Bertie alone seemed concerned, and listened attentively to Edward's account of all that had happened. He approved of Edward's decision to wait and see if a job materialised.

In the week before Christmas the awaited letter arrived. Leslie wrote enthusiastically. The post was in a large baker's. 'Back where I began,' was how he put it. He not only looked after the accounts but also took the van out twice a week to relieve other roundsmen. His weekly wage was modest but enough for his needs, he wrote.

Edward replied congratulating him, and telling him that he was paying the sum of two hundred and fifty pounds into his bank account which he hoped he would accept as a nest-egg and a Christmas present. He posted the letter with some misgivings. Was he simply trying to salve his conscience by handing over this money? He hoped not. What would Sep have thought? Well, maybe Sep would not have approved, but Edward had his own decisions to make now, he told himself firmly. He felt sure that it was right to supply his father with a bulwark against future storms. He felt equally sure that it had
been right to wait until he was established in a suitable job before providing that bulwark. Now it was up to his father.

Everything was now planned for their removal from the flat to the market square. After innumerable delays, the old house was free of workmen and, freshly decorated, awaited its owners.