The Stony Path (51 page)

She shut the door behind her, walking across to the large bay window and staring out on to the small front garden and the cobbled farmyard beyond, before turning and surveying the room.

Her stepbrother’s enormous feather bed had been removed and a smaller one installed, along with two chairs either side of the horsehair sofa. An ornate walnut writing desk and hardbacked chair occupied the far comer of the room just before the entrance into the dressing room, and a matching bookcase and occasional table took up most of the third wall. It was a pleasant milieu, even charming, but Hilda took no pleasure in her surroundings.

It
all
should have been hers by right, she told herself for the hundredth time as she turned to look out of the window again with dissatisfied eyes. The whole farm and the land and the farmhouse should be hers rather than her occupying this tiny corner of the house as though she was a lodger. Frederick had left it to her, he had, not his wife’s flyblow. But now God had placed the weapon of retribution in her hands and she would use it wisely when the time was right. And she’d know when that was.

The clatter of tea things from below and then the sound of Ruth’s high laugh floated up through the floorboards, and Hilda’s teeth ground together as her eyes narrowed into opaque slits. Oh, aye, she would know all right.

Arnold’s body was discovered by a group of Silksworth miners out for a walk the following Sunday, and by Monday afternoon – after the constable had called at the farm and it had been established that yes, they were aware of someone who was missing, and yes, he might well have been on his way to visit the farm – Luke had been called to identify his brother’s remains; remains which the cold weather had preserved surprisingly well.

Strange, the police remarked, that two caps were found, one being under the body and the other to the side of it. Was the deceased in the habit of carrying another cap about his person? Not that he knew of, Luke replied, but then his brother had been living in lodgings for some years before the accident, so he couldn’t rightly say what he had been about. And did Luke know, the police asked, if anyone had a grudge against his brother? Had there been an argument with anyone in the days before Arnold went missing, anything of that nature? Again, not that he knew of, Luke said stolidly, but then he had seen very little of his brother the last few years. Perhaps it was better to make enquiries among his cronies? And he did know Arnold was prone to doing a spot of . . . business in a certain area in the dockside now and again. That might prove a useful avenue of enquiry.

Hilda was very quiet and subdued for some time after the policemen’s visit to the farm, and then one morning at the beginning of June, when Ruth and Emily were busy in the dairy, Polly, sitting at the kitchen table preparing vegetables for dinner and chatting with Betsy, who was dicing meat for some brawn she was making, became aware of a figure standing watching her in the doorway. Betsy had just tipped the small pieces of shin beef into the large pan of cow heel simmering on the range with a meaty bacon bone at the base of it when Polly’s voice made her spin round as she said, ‘Mother?’ in a tone of high surprise.

Both women stared at Hilda. Not only was she out of bed and downstairs at the unheard-of time of nine o’clock, but she was fully dressed with her hat and coat on. To their knowledge Hilda had only left the farm once since Polly had brought the family to live there, and that had been for her stepbrother’s funeral.

‘It’s the first Monday in the month,’ Hilda said shortly in reply to Polly’s amazed face. ‘Market day. I thought I would go in to town with Croft; I presume he’s driving in as usual?’

Polly nodded. ‘Yes, he is.’

She was totally taken aback and it showed, and now Hilda smiled thinly as she said, ‘I thought the change would do me good. It’s time I got out a little.’

Believe that, believe anything! Betsy surveyed Hilda with narrowed eyes. The old biddy was up to something for sure. There had never been any love lost between the two women, but since the reading of the will, when Betsy had spoken her mind all too plainly, Hilda for the most part pretended the housekeeper didn’t exist. This troubled Betsy not at all, but she didn’t like this latest development. She said as much to Polly once the two women had watched Hilda – sitting as stiff as a board – drive off beside Croft in the horse and cart.

Polly nodded her agreement. The last weeks had been worrying ones, and if she had followed the dictates of her body she would have stayed in bed this morning. The child had been lying awkwardly for the last few days and she was finding she had to visit the privy more frequently, added to which an ache in her back felt like a giant fist pressing inwards and the feeling of nausea reminiscent of the first weeks of pregnancy had returned. But she couldn’t have lain in bed, she just couldn’t. Since they’d found Arnold all her hard-won stoicism had evaporated and she had Luke on her mind night and day.

Why hadn’t she noticed he had lost his cap that night? she had asked herself a thousand times since the constable had pointed out that this might not be a straightforward accident after all. Only to answer silently in the next breath, You weren’t in a state to notice anything, that’s why. And they couldn’t prove it was Luke’s, or anyone else’s if it came to it . . . could they?

Half a mile or so away Croft, after one or two fruitless attempts, had given up trying to make conversation with the ‘old witch’ – as Hilda was referred to privately by the farm workers – and the journey into Bishopwearmouth was conducted in silence.

After the relentless ice and snow of the long winter, spring had decided to arrive with spectacular gusto some weeks previously, and on this mild, early June day the sun had brought to birth the scents of myriad wild flowers and rapidly growing vegetation in the rich earthy air.

It was all quite lost on Hilda, however. Polly’s mother was blind and deaf to everything but the desire to prove what she knew in her heart to be true: that Luke Blackett was the father of her daughter’s baby and that somehow Arnold had found out about their affair and been murdered for it. Whether to keep him quiet or in an argument over Polly Hilda wasn’t sure – she knew full well Arnold had always desired her elder daughter and that courting Ruth had been a ruse to gain access to the farm, but the situation had amused her, especially because it was clear that Polly loathed the man and didn’t like having him in her home. It had given Hilda great satisfaction to encourage Arnold all she could.

However, suspicion and conjecture wasn’t enough, even though according to the police their enquiries at the colliery and Arnold’s lodgings indicted that Arnold had gone missing the very same night Frederick had arrived home without Polly and her daughter had stumbled in later, wet through and covered in mud, supposedly from a fall. A fall! Polly had obviously avoided meeting Frederick on purpose so she could be with Luke, and it was clear Arnold had either followed them or arranged to meet them to discuss what he knew. He might even have been blackmailing them. Hilda’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully. Whatever, she was going to dig and dig until she found out something – anything – to confirm she was on the right track. Someone, somewhere knew something or had seen something. She would use Arnold’s relationship with Ruth as her excuse; what was more natural than a concerned mother trying to find out what had happened to her dear daughter’s betrothed in order to bring her daughter a little peace of mind in these dreadful circumstances? Yes, that was the tack she would take.

Once in the town Hilda told Croft she would be taking a horse cab home because she was going to be late; there was an old friend she was going to see. Croft could relay that message to Mrs Weatherburn and tell her not to expect her at any specific time.

Hilda now began to work methodically through the list she had made. She visited Arnold’s old lodgings first but got no joy there; neither did she gain any information in the colliery office or in the shops round Arnold’s lodgings and then later Southwick Road. By tea time she was tired and discouraged and ready to give up. She had spoken to the neighbours at both Arnold’s lodgings and the house in Southwick Road, and although she had had several cups of tea and conversations about everything from Mr Asquith’s refusal to accept the unions’ demand for a minimum wage for miners to the dreadful price of bread at tuppence a loaf – neither of which interested Hilda in the slightest – she had learned nothing of interest.

She had actually decided she could do nothing more that day, after being embroiled in a fruitless conversation with an old lady for nigh on half an hour at the top end of Southwick Road, and was making her way down the street whilst keeping a weather eye out for Luke – the last thing she needed was to see him – when a lighted window in the house but one to the Blacketts’ made her hesitate. There had been no one at home earlier when she had knocked at that door, and as she was passing . . . A pretty, fluffy-haired lass answered the door, her dark eyes in striking contrast to her fair curls. She listened with interest as Hilda began to explain the reason for her call, and then she stretched out her arm and pulled her inside.

Twenty minutes later the door opened and Hilda emerged on to the street again, but now her eyes were bright and her face was flushed. Her stepbrother had always quoted a saying when he was at his most pompous, one that had grated on her unbearably after she had heard it the first ten times, but now it came into her mind and she found herself saying it out loud as she hurried towards Thomas Street to see about a horse cab. ‘The mills of God grind slowly but they grind exceedingly fair.’
Oh, yes
. She stopped for a moment, lifting her face to the evening air, which was warm and moist, and putting her hand to her heart, which was racing alarmingly. She must calm down. She took several deep breaths to compose herself. What if she really did have a weak heart? But no, no, it was the excitement, that was all. She was as fit as a fiddle and she intended to live a long and enjoyable life as the rightful mistress of Stone Farm.

She smiled to herself, smoothing down her coat and adjusting her neat felt hat with gloved hands. Thought you’d cheat me, did you, Polly my girl? Well, think again, Aye, think again. This isn’t over yet by a long chalk.

Chapter Twenty-two

It was another full week before Hilda went into town again with Croft on market day. Polly, under protest, had spent the intervening days in bed, due to the doctor diagnosing a nasty kidney infection after Betsy, worried about her mistress’s condition, called him out. The icebag on her back and the chloroform ointment, along with the gallons of boiled water Betsy made her drink with the medicine the doctor had prescribed, did the trick, but Polly was still pale and tired when Hilda arrived back at the farmhouse after her second outing.

Polly was sitting on one of the sofas in the sitting room with her feet up, and as she glanced at Hilda, who was standing in the doorway looking at her with an odd expression on her face, she said politely, ‘Did you have an enjoyable time, Mother?’ keeping any apprehension out of her voice. Like Betsy, she didn’t trust the reason for these sudden excursions after years of self-imposed incarceration.

‘Wonderful.’ It was high and animated. ‘Just wonderful.’

‘Good.’

They stared at each other, but Hilda didn’t break the silence for some seconds, and then she said, ‘You shouldn’t have prevented me inheriting what was rightfully mine, girl. You know that, don’t you?’

‘Mother, we’ve had this conversation before. As Frederick’s wife, most folk would agree I should have been the main beneficiary of his will anyway, but certainly in view of his wishes concerning the child you have no cause for complaint. And I’ve told you I will be more than happy to give you an allowance.’

‘An allowance! Huh!’ Hilda now stretched her neck and, her tone changing into one of thin bitterness, said tightly, ‘I am going to my room but I would like you to remember this conversation, Polly.’

‘I’ll remember it, Mother.’ And it was Hilda who looked away first, turning and flouncing from the room as she muttered something indiscernible under her breath.

Once she was alone Polly leaned back against the cushions of the sofa with a deep sigh. How was it, with her father having been such an easy-going, sensitive soul, that he had been ensnared by two of the most unnatural women in the world? Unnatural in different ways admittedly, but unnatural all the same. But then she knew the answer to that, she told herself silently. It was her father’s inherent weakness that both of them, in their own ways, had fastened on to.

And then she shook her head irritably, annoyed with herself. Why was she wasting time thinking of her father now? She ought to be trying to determine what her mother was about, because she
was
up to something, for sure. Polly eased her position on the sofa, resting her hand on the raised dome of her stomach for a moment. The doctor had said that either she had an excess of water or the baby was a large one, and that in either case the confinement could well be early. She hoped that would be the case, oh, she did. Since they had found Arnold’s body, this pregnancy had suddenly become intolerable.

And then, as the evening drew on, her mind returned to the problem of her mother, worrying at it like a dog with a bone, and she could find no peace of mind.

Very early on the morning of the twelfth of June, two days after Hilda’s second trip into Bishopwearmouth, Luke was awakened from a deep sleep by the sound of banging on the front door. An hour later he was sitting in a police cell, his head spinning with the speed at which his world had fallen apart. They knew. Somehow they knew. He glanced round the small, dank cell, his hands clasped in front of him and hanging loosely between his knees.