The Tulip Girl (22 page)

Michael wrinkled his forehead. ‘Well, I would have thought that now they’re just coming out they don’t want to be left much longer in the heat. We don’t want them too far
out, do we?’

Maddie bit her lip worriedly. ‘No, I suppose not.’

‘I don’t think just the rest of today will hurt.’ Nick shrugged his shoulders. ‘Let’s face it, we’re going to have to learn by our own mistakes a bit at
first, aren’t we? I mean Bill Randall can’t tell us everything. We’ve got to stand on our own feet.’

Maddie and Michael exchanged an amused glance. Nick was right, they had to agree, but such a statement coming from the boy whose mother ruled his every waking moment made them want to laugh.

‘You’ve got a point there,’ Michael put his hand on Nick’s shoulder. ‘So what do we do? Pick ’em and pack ’em now or wait ’til tonight?’

‘Pick half of them now and the other half tonight and let’s see for ourselves if it makes any difference,’ Nick suggested.

Michael laughed. ‘You’re full of bright ideas this morning. That’s exactly what we’ll do, but we must get them to the station by six o’clock at the latest. At tulip
time, you know, Wellandon handles hundreds of boxes every night. Before the War it was thousands and the number is building up again as more and more flower growers are turning away from food
production as soon as they’re allowed. Of course, there won’t be that many this time of the year, but I don’t want ours to get left aside in favour of the regular growers.’
He bit his lip. ‘I think I’ll drive into town this morning, just to make sure that everything’s all right for this first consignment. After that, it should be plain
sailing.’

Through the day, Maddie picked all the flowers that were ready, laying them carefully in the wooden boxes in neat bunches. ‘I’m coming with you,’ she informed Michael as she
helped him load the boxes into the boot of Frank’s car. ‘I want to see this first lot on their way for myself.’

‘Don’t you trust me with your precious tulips?’

She grinned at him, ‘Of course I don’t. You might decide to give them away to all your girlfriends in the village.’

Michael’s dark eyes sparkled with fun. ‘And when have I had time to see any girlfriends the last few weeks? Besides . . .’ Now the look in his eyes was serious. ‘The only
girl I want is right here with me all the time.’

He reached out and grasped her hand, squeezing it tightly. ‘Come on, let’s go and sell your flowers.’

‘Our flowers,’ she corrected him as she climbed into the passenger’s seat beside him. ‘Everyone deserves the credit. Even . . .’ she smiled impishly at him,
‘even Mrs Trowbridge.’

‘Oho,’ Michael laughed. ‘Now it really hurt you to say that, didn’t it?’

Maddie said no more; she didn’t need to.

It was dusk when they returned to the farm.

‘Well, Tulip, that’s the first safely away and we’re still living up to our name,’ Michael said as he got out of the car and stood in the yard.

‘Eh?’

‘Few Farm. Only now it’s a few ’taties, a few caulis and a few tulips.’

‘Oh you!’ Laughing Maddie pushed Michael on the shoulder and, playfully, he caught hold of her hands, pulling her close to him, his dark brown eyes looking down into hers. The
longing flared between them and suddenly the smile faded from Michael’s eyes. She felt as if the breath had been knocked from her body as she looked up at him, her lips slightly apart. For a
brief moment they were lost in a world of their own until Harriet’s voice from the back doorway made them both jump and spring apart.

‘Your supper’s ready.’

When Maddie turned to walk towards the housekeeper, it was to see the look of pure hatred on the woman’s face. For some time Harriet must have suspected that there was something between
her favourite and the orphan girl she had brought into the house.

Now she had seen it for herself and knew for certain.

It was in the January, when the blooms in the glasshouse were at their most delicate stage, that Maddie began to feel unwell.

Carrying another heavy tray in from the field to the second glasshouse, she felt suddenly dizzy and before she realized what was happening she had dropped the box and was pitching forward, the
ground coming up to meet her.

‘Maddie! Maddie, what is it?’

She heard Frank’s anxious shout from behind her. She was trying to rise as he reached her.

‘Have you hurt yourself, love? I shouldn’t be letting you carry these heavy boxes. I ought to have got Michael or Nick to do it.’

‘I – I’m all right, Mr Frank. Please. I must have tripped . . .’ She bit her lip, not wanting to tell him a deliberate lie yet determined not to admit that she had been
feeling queasy for the past week now. She couldn’t be ill. Not now when there was so much work to do.

‘You look a bit pale, love. You’ve been overdoing it. We shouldn’t let you work so hard.’

Slowly Maddie got to her knees and then, carefully, she stood up. Frank held her arm, supporting her. ‘We’ve all been working hard, Mr Frank.’ She made herself smile at him,
even though the waves of dizziness were still washing over her.

Frank nodded and looked down at her. ‘We have. But you, harder than any of us.’ Gently, he added, ‘You didn’t need to prove yourself to us, you know. We wouldn’t
have blamed you even if your idea hadn’t worked.’ Then he smiled broadly. ‘But it is doing, lass, I know it is. You should be feeling very proud of yourself.’

Maddie swallowed the bile that threatened to rise into her throat. ‘We all should, Mr Frank,’ she insisted, but nevertheless she was very touched by his words.

She took a few deep breaths and began to feel a little better. Together they knelt down and gathered the spilt bulbs back into the box.

‘I just hope I haven’t harmed these. They damage very easily, don’t they?’

‘Mm,’ Frank agreed. ‘I sometimes wonder if we shouldn’t have daffs as well. They’re a bit hardier. But I don’t know.’

‘Maybe we could. In time.’

He chuckled. ‘You had thought about it, then?’

‘Oh yes, I’d thought about it.’

Now Frank laughed louder. ‘I thought you might have.’

They stood up together as he lifted the tray from the ground. ‘Now, young lady, I’m carrying this into the greenhouse for you and you’re not to carry any more heavy boxes
today. And you get an early night. You hear me?’

Maddie managed to smile and say, ‘Yes, Mr Frank.’

‘You little slut!’ The bedroom door was flung open so violently, it struck the bed behind it and ricocheted, shuddering.

Maddie, spittle running from her mouth where she had been retching into the bowl, raised bleary eyes to see Harriet towering over her.

‘You’re in the family way, aren’t you?’

Horrified, Maddie straightened up and reached for the towel to wipe her mouth. ‘What – what do you mean?’

‘I’ve heard you. Every morning this week you’ve had your head over that bowl there. You’ve got morning sickness, girl. And last night when Mr Frank said you’d
fallen in the field and looked as if you were going to pass out, then I was sure.’

Maddie gasped, her eyes widening. ‘No. Oh, no.’

‘Oh yes,’ the housekeeper said grimly. ‘Well, we’ll see what Mr Frank has to say about this little lot, shall we?’

Maddie reached out and grasped the woman’s arm. ‘Please don’t tell him, Mrs Trowbridge.’

Maddie didn’t think she had ever seen such malice in anyone’s eyes. Such venom, such glee. ‘I can’t
wait
to tell him.’

‘Look, I know you want me gone from here. So, all right, you win. I’ll go away but not until we’ve got all the cropping done at the end of April, and maybe the lifting in June.
Then I’ll go. But please don’t tell Mr Frank. I mean – I mean you don’t want to cause him any more worry, do you?’ She was babbling now in her anxiety.
‘He’s just getting back on his feet. The flowers from the glasshouses made good money in London at Christmas and New Year and they’re still selling well. But there’s a lot
of work. I can’t possibly go yet.’

Harriet’s face was a sneer. ‘How do you think you’re going to hide it, eh? You’ll start to show before then. Don’t you know anything about having babies?’

Maddie didn’t answer. No, she knew nothing or she would have already guessed. Instead, she said, ‘Then I’ll go before I start to – to show. Mr Frank needn’t know.
No one need know.’ Casting about frantically for another reason, she added, ‘And you don’t want him blaming you for not having kept a better eye on me.’

‘Blame me!’ She was indignant. ‘I’m not the one to blame. He was too soft with you from the start. Letting you go to the village dances and round on the milk cart with
young Michael. And then giving way to your ridiculous scheme to grow flowers.’ She almost spat the next question. ‘Whose brat is it, anyway?’

Maddie gasped aloud. ‘It’s Michael’s.’

‘Huh! I don’t believe that for a minute. It’s some village lad’s, I don’t doubt.’

‘It is Michael’s. It is.’ Maddie was almost in tears at the injustice of the woman. How could she believe that it could possibly be anyone else’s?

‘I love Michael. I wouldn’t let anyone else . . .’ she hesitated and then added, ‘touch me.’

Harriet’s lips were a thin, unforgiving line. ‘You dirty, foul-mouthed little trollop. Well, if it is his, you’ve led him on. I don’t blame him. I blame you. You’re
out on your ear now, that’s for certain. Because I’ll not stand by and see you pull a fine young man like Master Michael down into the gutter alongside you, saddling him with your
little bastard.’

She pulled her arm from Maddie’s grasp and turned to leave the room. The girl sank down onto the bed and groaned. She knew what Harriet had said was true. She had no reason to doubt the
older woman’s knowledge and during the past week she had wondered why what she had first thought was a bilious attack was going on so long. It had struck her as very odd. Now she knew
why.

That the housekeeper would take great delight in telling the rest of the household, Maddie had no doubt, so she dragged herself up again and dressed.

Better face the music, she told herself.

Halfway down the stairs, she heard the raised voices. Frank’s and then Michael’s.

‘How could you? A young girl in our care, Michael. And she’s still under age. You could go to prison for this, never mind the trouble you’ve brought on her and shame upon this
house.’

As Maddie opened the door leading from the stairs into the living room, she saw that Michael and his father were standing on the hearth rug in front of the fire, staring at each other. His face
white, Michael said, ‘What do you mean, under age?’

‘She’s only fifteen, for God’s sake.’

‘No. Oh no. She can’t be. She’s sixteen. Surely, she’s sixteen?’ He was casting about frantically. ‘She had a birthday. She told us so. We had a party.
She’s got to be sixteen.’

‘She was fourteen when she came here,’ Harriet put in. ‘So now she’s fifteen.’

‘Fourteen?’ Michael’s voice was a strangled whisper of disbelief. ‘How could she have left school at fourteen? I was fifteen when I left. So was Nick.’

Frank ran his hand through his hair. ‘You stayed on a little longer because you were at a Grammar School and Harriet wanted Nick to stay on a little longer too. The statutory
school-leaving age has only gone up to fifteen this last year.’

‘I didn’t know, Dad. I swear I didn’t. I thought she was sixteen. I never touched her until after that party. And I wouldn’t have done so yet, if – if . .
.’

His voice trailed away and he looked so desperate and almost afraid that Maddie longed to run to him, put her arms about him and tell him that she would take all the blame. She wouldn’t
let anything dreadful happen to him. But she remained quite still just inside the door, watching and listening.

Then she heard Michael pull in a deep, shuddering breath. ‘I’ll take care of her, Dad. I’ll . . .’

‘And how are you going to do that? The farm is barely supporting us now. With another mouth to feed and without Maddie able to work, how do you think we’re going to manage? And
changing to growing blasted flowers. I wish I’d never listened to her now. In fact, I wish to God . . .’

Frank became aware of Maddie standing, ashen-faced, in the doorway. He glanced at her and then looked away, running his hand distractedly through his thinning hair yet again. Harriet, standing
at the end of the table, her arms folded beneath her bosom, watched the scene unfolding before her, a gleam of satisfaction in her eyes.

Nick was sitting at the table, his eyes downcast on his cereal bowl, though he was not eating. Only Michael came to her. He put his arms about her and his voice was gentle now as he said,
‘Oh Maddie. I’m sorry. Why didn’t you tell me?’

‘I . . .’ At his kindness, Maddie felt the tears spill over as she laid her cheek against his chest. ‘I didn’t know.’

Now he held her at arm’s length and looked down at her. ‘What do you mean, you didn’t know?’

Blinking through her tears, she stammered, ‘I didn’t understand why I was being sick in the morning.’

‘You mean you haven’t seen a doctor?’

Maddie shook her head.

‘Oh well, then . . .’ Instantly there was relief in his voice. ‘Maybe you aren’t.’

‘But Mrs Trowbridge . . .’ she began.

Now his tone was bitter. ‘Oh aye, we all know that our dear housekeeper would do almost anything to get you sent away.’ He looked over his shoulder, his eyes narrowing as he looked
towards Harriet and speaking directly to her now. ‘But what I can’t understand is why you brought Maddie here in the first place.’

‘Her sort should be punished. They bring misery to good folk around them with their devious, scheming ways. And I was right, wasn’t I? She’s brought trouble on this house, just
like I said she would.’

‘So why?’ Michael persisted. He had let go of Maddie and was moving back towards Harriet now. ‘Why did you bring her here?’

‘That’s my business,’ she snapped.

‘Let’s not go into all that now,’ Frank said wearily. ‘We’ve got to think what’s the best thing to do.’

Harriet rounded on him. ‘Whatever do you mean? There’s only one thing to do. Throw her out. Out on the streets where the little slut belongs.’