The Silver Touch (20 page)

Letticia’s deduction was close to the truth, although it had not been as hasty a decision as she supposed. In fact, it had involved much discussion between John and Hester, he seeing the threat of Sheffield Plate as a reason against a move from Nixon Square; she convinced that a step towards greater independence was long overdue. John was sufficiently established now as a dependable outworker to take himself beyond the city boundaries where he would no longer be tied by many of its laws that restricted those, such as himself, with the skill in his craft to match any man but without the qualifications.

He was not, and never would be, an ambitious businessman, as she had discovered long since. His sole aim was security for her and the children, which in itself was highly commendable and far more than countless women received from their husbands. She was grateful for it but nobody could advance without some risk and to avoid it was stultifying. She truly believed that if he had attained his Freedom of the Goldsmiths Company he would have been content to jog along as he did now, leaving the fame and glory to others. At least with Joss it would be different. Joss would bring renown to his father’s name.

There was also another reason, no less important, why she had favoured a move. John worked extremely hard, as he had always done, and she was convinced that to be on the outskirts of the city and away from the river fogs when his day’s labour was done would be immensely beneficial to him. Now and again he was subject to a slight cough and although her herbal mixture of hore-hound, honey and egg-white soon banished it, she felt that the sweeter, cleaner air of the countryside should prevent further recurrence. It was an enormous relief to her when the move took place.

Bunhill Row ran right through the parish of St Luke’s, the southern end being mainly commercial due to its nearness to the hub of the city. There many prosperous businesses stood shoulder to shoulder, including the House of Whitbread which made some of the best ale to be had anywhere. Towards the northern end it was mainly residential, although there was an armoury house in a large artillery ground and the residences, all well built and occupied mostly by well-to-do tradesmen and successful artisans, thinned out gradually into open countryside with Bunhill Fields rich with wooded groves and the glint of streams.

It was this open view that stretched beyond the windows of Number 107, the Batemans’ new home in a row of three houses standing quite alone with gardens to the rear. Part of their garden was taken up by a light, airy workshop, solidly designed, where the windows could be opened to the balmy country air.

John and Hester were soon to become acquainted with their neighbours and Peter made friends the first day with the twin brothers of the Beaver family who resided at Number 84. They brought along some other boys, nearly all of them around the same age, and Peter was immediately absorbed into the group. Elizabeth Beaver, who happened to be his age exactly, had trailed in after her brothers. She stood staring at him with large sapphire-blue eyes, her fair hair tied up with a pink ribbon, and offered him one of the sticky toffee pieces that she had with her in a twist of paper. He took a piece and thanked her as best he could. It almost filled his mouth.

‘I helped my mother make it,’ she informed him.

‘It tastes good.’

By then the others had fallen on the toffee and taken every piece. She did not complain, simply licking off whatever sugary fragments remained on the paper. Hester, sighting her from the window, invited her in to meet Letticia and Ann. There was nothing tomboyish about her, quite the reverse, there being something almost ethereal about her looks, but although she became friendly with the girls she was to remain one of the boys’ group, always on the outskirts, mostly ignored, but stead-fastly attempting to join in the games and climb trees and run races. Hester took to her, admiring her spirit, and was pleased whenever she came to the house.

On her own first day in her new home Hester had seen again birds she had not fed since childhood and Peter, who was clever with his hands, made a little bird-table for her in spite of unwanted help from William.

‘Leave that saw alone! Put down that hammer!’ Exasperated, Peter finally dealt his brother a harder clout than he had intended and shoved him away. ‘Go back indoors.’

William withdrew a few steps. The blow had hurt but he did not cry easily. He fixed his eyes on Peter in unspoken appeal and waited. It did not take long. He saw his brother glance towards him reluctantly and sigh.

‘Oh, very well. You can hold the nails for me.’

William beamed. ‘I won’t drop them, I promise.’ He did, of course, quite accidentally, and they had to search for them in the overgrown grass of what would soon be a lawn again.

Hester had plans for the garden. There was room here for flowers and vegetables as well as her herbs. Already everything there had run wild in the interim when the house had stood empty, waiting to be sold, and she would have to call in a gardener. The herbs she would sow herself when the spadework was done and she would replant those brought from Nixon Square. She felt she had never been happier. She had loved the house from first sight. It was solid and unpretentious, not as large as its neighbours on either side but roomy and spacious with softwood-panelled walls, dentilled cornices and pleasing fireplaces. There should never be any need to move again. Here she could put down her roots once and for all.

John was also pleased with the new location when his last doubts about the wisdom of the move finally vanished. It was a far better area in which to bring up the children, Hester was happy as a lark to be back in the countryside and he and his workshop were still within convenient reach of the city. He could walk to his favourite coffee-house to talk shop with other followers of his craft in less than an hour and, although he was not much of a drinking man, there was a tavern called the Royal Oak within a few yards of his new home. Lying back from the street, which at this far end of Bunhill Row had petered out into a country lane, the tavern stood wall to wall with a large mansion, presently closed, which belonged to a London banker, James Esdaile. The forecourt of the tavern ran parallel to the well-kept flower garden that fronted the mansion, divided off by the high garden wall which surrounded the Esdaile property. In the tavern, he heard once more about the absent owner from local residents and he related what he had learned in turn to Hester.

‘He is a widower with a twenty-year-old son and two younger daughters already wed. He rarely comes to the Bunhill Row residence.’

‘Why is that, do you think?’

‘It’s not his only home. He has a house in the city and another country seat at Great Gains, which he obviously prefers to Bunhill Row.’

‘I’ve looked through the gates. Everything is in perfect order. It must be a considerable expense to keep up a property never used.’

John smiled. ‘From what I hear it wouldn’t matter to him. He’s a wealthy man whose father began supplying accoutrements to the army from the building that is now the Royal Oak, which explains its cheek-by-jowl position to the house. It was a family business but James Esdaile himself founded and is head of the Bank of Esdaile, Hammet and Company in Lombard Street.’

Hester sat back in her chair and tapped her cheek thoughtfully with a forefinger. ‘Such a grand house must have a herb garden somewhere in its grounds and mine is not going to be properly established until next year. Do you think there would be any objection to my taking what I needed if I speak to the Esdaile gardener?’

‘I should suppose none at all.’

‘Then I’ll seek out the fellow tomorrow.’

He was not difficult to find, for he lived in a cottage along a lane that branched off Bunhill Row. Thomas Cole was a thin-faced man in his early thirties with the ruddy complexion of those whose living keeps them outdoors. His wife, who had a toddler at her skirts and a baby in her arms, proved to be the cleaner at the Esdaile mansion.

‘Tom does the outside and I does in,’ she informed Hester cheerfully. ‘You take whatever ’erbs you want. We’ve a patch of our own ’ere and so those at the big ’ouse never gets picked.’

‘I shall appreciate having them.’ Hester put some money on the table as a sign of appreciation. Mrs Coles promptly scooped it up and popped it into her apron pocket. She was undoubtedly the dominant partner.

‘Do you want a gardener at your ’ouse, Mrs Bateman? The garden there looks a real jungle.’

That was the other reason why Hester had called. ‘I was about to ask your husband if he would like to take it on.’ She turned deliberately to him. ‘Would you?’

‘Yes, ma’am. I’ll start whenever you like.’ He looked pleased at getting some voice in his own affairs. It was short-lived. His wife elbowed him out of the way.

‘’E’ll chop wood and put up shelves or anything else you want done. ’E’s real ’andy.’

Hester was glad to get away from the cottage. She thought Tom a pleasant, quiet man, who would be an asset to have around the place, and she pitied him for his loud-talking wife.

Over a month passed before she had a chance to get to the Esdaile herb garden, because the hold-up in work due to the move meant that John was in urgent need of her at the bench. Fortunately Abigail, while still keeping the children in her charge, eased her mistress’s domestic yoke by taking on the training and supervision of two local girls whom Hester had engaged as house-servants to replace those employed at Nixon Square who had not wanted to leave the city.

It was a warm, sunny day when Hester, a basket on her arm, eventually pushed open one of the tall ornamental double gates that led to the Esdaile mansion. She had notified Tom the day before of her coming and he had left them unpadlocked for her. The lawns on either side of the short gravelled drive were like velvet, not a wayward daisy to be seen, proof in plenty that Tom was both a watchful gardener and a conscientious man. She paused to look up at the house, which was built substantially in rosy brick with moulded stone architraves to the tall windows that were shuttered from within. The entrance, which owed the shine of its brass door furniture to Mrs Cole’s polishing, was sheltered by an elegant porch supported by Doric columns, three steps leading down from it to the gravelled drive where she stood. It looked a good family house, one that should have been alive with the movement and vitality it must have known in the past. The shutters gave it a sad, lifeless look, and there was a tomblike stillness to it in contrast to the bustle of the tavern fettered to its north end.

A path led from the drive and she followed it past the south end of the house to meet a vista of more lawns, shady trees and colourful flowerbeds. It was like entering another world, no sound reaching here from the tavern yard or the wheels along the lane. Only the birds broke the stillness, giving full throat to the glorious day. The fragrance of roses and honeysuckle hung in the air. She made her way to a stone seat and sat for a while savouring the beauty and peace of her surroundings. Curiously, she had the sensation of time being suspended in this place and she smiled at the illusion, for many matters awaited her attention at home where the hands of many clocks would be whirling on. With effort, she bestirred herself and after a little exploration found the path behind a box hedge that would have allowed servants to pass between the kitchen garden and their own regions without being seen by anyone at leisure in the grounds.

The muted scent of the herbs reached her before she saw them and then suddenly they were there in orderly profusion, the variation of colours giving the look of a patchwork quilt to the section of the kitchen garden they occupied. She was not surprised that another hedge made this a private place, because often the lady of the house would let nobody else have access to her herbs, dealing them out herself when they were needed for cooking, and making her own selection without witness for her distillations if she were a true herbalist.

Hester threaded her way slowly and carefully through the herbs, stooping or kneeling to gather what she required, snipping carefully with scissors and laying her harvest into the basket set down beside her. She marvelled at the lush growth of each herb. Butterflies fluttered about her and bees came and went. Nothing gave warning when suddenly the peace was shattered.

‘Who the devil are you?’

Startled, she looked up with a gasp and sat back on her heels. A large man, tall and broad, had bellowed at her in a blend of fury and astonishment, a resonance to his deep voice that could have belonged to a baritone in opera. Aged about forty, with a determined set to his head and shoulders, he had an astute, powerful face, large-nosed and strong-jawed, with greenish eyes that glinted at her between narrowed, hooded lids. Guessing his identity from the little she had heard about him, she rose to her feet with her dignity unimpaired, highly conscious of being pinpointed as a trespasser — she was a mature, law-abiding woman of thirty-nine years. The additional adage of being a wife and mother did not come to her then for a reason she was only to comprehend later.

‘You must be James Esdaile,’ she said evenly, dispensing with prefixes. ‘I’m Hester Bateman, new to the neighbourhood from the city. I never expected to see you, much less meet you, in such angry circumstances. I’ll leave at once.’ She picked up her basket and turned to cross to the verge on the opposite side of the herbal patch, away from him.

‘How near a neighbour are you?’ His tone had eased. ‘Surely not at the tavern?’

She paused to glance in his direction. With the anger gone from his face he was still a dramatic-looking man and his settled features now gave the impression of one who would be prepared to reason and consider whatever was brought before him. There were even creases at the corners of his eyes that could only have come from laughter in happier moments, and for the first time she noticed that his lips had a sensual fleshiness indicating a fondness for the pleasures of life. But the situation had taken a turn-about. She was the hostile one now.