Time Shall Reap (32 page)

Suddenly, inexplicably, she was standing by the quarry again, and could feel herself drawing back from the brink. She had been unable – unwilling? – to end her life when she was given the opportunity, and she would have to make the best of it.

Elspeth had sat in her chair all night, weeping in self-pity and regretting the past by turns. She had heard her husband pacing the floor of the spare room and had pitied him for the torment he must be going through. When she heard him coming out of the spare room, she sat up in the hope that he would come and tell her that he didn’t want her to leave, after all, but he went straight into the bathroom. As soon as she heard the door opening again, she ran into the hall, determined to make him talk to her. ‘David,’ she began, ‘I’m really sorry for what I did ...’

His eyes were like flint as he looked at her. ‘There’s no point in saying anything else. I haven’t changed my mind, and I don’t want to find you here when I get home tonight.’

‘Oh, please, David, listen to me. I thought you wouldn’t want to marry me if you knew I’d had an illegitimate child, that’s why I didn’t tell you. I should have known you were too good a man to ...’

‘I was too gullible,’ he snapped. ‘I suppose you married me because you were sorry for me.’

‘I married you because I loved you, and I didn’t want to hurt you after what you’d been through. That’s why I let Helen and Jimmy keep John.’

His expression had softened a little, but unfortunately his eyes fell on the grandfather clock. ‘And you were quite happy to take that thing into my house so you could remember your lover?’ he said, coldly.

‘I didn’t want to take it, my mother could have told you that it was Mrs Forrest that made me.’

‘Your mother had known about your bastard, of course. She must have taken me for a proper fool.’

‘I told her the baby died.’

‘What an accomplished liar you were, and did the other woman know ... his mother?’

‘No, Mrs Forrest never knew about it. Oh, David, all the lies I told were to save you being hurt.’

‘But you ended up crucifying me, and I could never trust you again. Get out of my way, I have to get dressed.’

She stood aside then, her shoulders drooping, her senses numb, but she knew that the pain would come later. Mean-time, she had to make one last effort, but as soon as David came out of the bedroom she could tell by his face that it would be useless. Nevertheless, she tried. ‘Please ...?’

‘Take whatever you want,’ he frowned, ‘because you’ll never get back.’

She stood for some minutes after he went out, but at last she went to wash and change her clothes. If she had to leave, it would be best to go as quickly as possible. After packing some things into a suitcase, she went into the scullery to make herself a cup of tea, and just over ten minutes later she walked into the hall again. Half past nine on her beloved grandfather clock, which had been the cause of David’s well-founded jealousy, and which he would likely get rid of once she had gone. Opening the door, she took one last look at the pendulum with its entwined initials JF–EG. This was her only legacy of John Forrest’s love ... no, that wasn’t altogether true. He had also left her with something far more precious than this – his son ... the son she had deserted and cruelly wounded, though John wouldn’t know yet about what she had done to him, not unless Laura had gone straight to Edinburgh after she walked out last night.

Elspeth gulped. This was the end of more than twenty-one years of marriage, the end of David, of Laura, of John. She would have to start from scratch again, but she had made one fresh start in her life carrying only a Gladstone bag – though look how that had ended – and this time she had a suitcase. Where would she go from here? Not to Helen Watson this time, for she had inflicted enough trouble on her already. Without planning it, Elspeth found herself walking down King’s Gate. Ann Robb would advise her what to do.

The doctor’s wife was surprised when her young maid showed Elspeth in, and alarmed when she saw the case. ‘Where are you going? I hope nothing’s wrong?’

‘Oh, Mrs Robb, David knows about John and there’s been an awful row.’

‘How on earth did he find out, Elspeth? Who could have told him? Surely not Mr or Mrs Watson?’

‘Laura and John fell in love and they were going to get married, so I had to tell her and David myself, and she said she’d never forgive me and just walked out.’

‘Oh, Elspeth, I’m so sorry, but what about David?’

‘He’s put me out. He said he couldn’t trust me again after the lies I told.’

Ann felt like reminding her that she’d been advised at the time to be honest with her bridegroom, but Elspeth was in no fit state for that. ‘Have you anywhere to go?’

‘That’s why I came to you ... oh!’ Elspeth stopped, and added hastily, ‘I wasn’t asking you to take me in. I just thought you’d tell me what I could do.’

‘Look, my dear, you’re quite welcome to stay, for as long as you want. Alex won’t mind, and the children are away.’

Elspeth knew that Alexander was an officer in the Seaforth Highlanders, and that Laura was married to a captain in the Merchant Navy and living in Portsmouth, but she couldn’t accept Mrs Robb’s offer. ‘I’d be too near David here. I’ll have to go right away, but I can’t think where.’

Correctly interpreting her problem, Mrs Robb said, ‘If you’re worried about money, you’ll have to find yourself a job wherever you go.’

‘But I haven’t worked since I was married, and ...’

‘Wait!’ Ann’s head shot up. ‘Didn’t you tell me once that your mother had told her solicitor to put the money he got from the sale of her belongings in a trust for you?’

A rather uncertain, tremulous smile hovered on Elspeth’s lips for a moment. ‘I’d forgotten that. She must have had second sight, for she said there could come a time when I’d need it. There wouldn’t be much, but it would see me through for a wee while. Oh, Mrs Robb, I knew I could count on you.’

‘I haven’t done anything. You’d have remembered yourself when you were calmer. Do you have enough money for your fare to Auchlonie to see the solicitor?’

‘I’ve a few pounds in my purse.’

‘Well, if you run into any problems over the trust, come back here and we’ll see what we can work out. As my mother used to say, “There’s light at the end of every tunnel.”’

Elspeth left King’s Gate more confident about the future. At forty-four, she surely wasn’t too old to begin anew.

When she arrived in the village of her birth, not much over an hour later, she went directly to Mr Reid’s office. He had been a friend of the family, besides being Lizzie’s solicitor, and welcomed her warmly. ‘It’s a long time since I’ve seen you, Elspeth. It must have been at your mother’s funeral, I suppose.’

‘It must be, I haven’t been back since.’

Her obvious tension made him stop making small talk. ‘What can I do for you, Elspeth?’

‘Well, my marriage is finished, Mr Reid, and I ...’

His cheery smile faded. ‘I’m sorry to hear that. Have you come to instigate divorce proceedings?’

She was horrified. ‘It’s nothing like that. I’ve come to ask about the money you’ve been holding in trust for me. My mother said I could get it when I needed it.’

‘Certainly.’ Lifting his pen, he twirled it idly in his fingers. ‘You’ll be wondering how much is involved?’

‘It’ll not be much, for she’d a hard struggle to make ends meet all her life, but even ten pounds would be a blessing.’

Mr Reid beamed. ‘You’ll be blessed two-hundred-fold, then. There’s over two thousand pounds. Perhaps I should have written to tell you, but I gathered that your mother did not want you to find out the amount of her estate until you needed it, not that she would have had any idea how large it would be. All her effects were sold, and the grand-father clock brought in more than all the rest put together.’

‘Father aye said it was worth a lot, but I never ...’

‘An American friend of mine, a dealer in antiques, was here on holiday at the time, and recognized it as being the work of a famous clock-maker of the eighteenth century. He was astonished that such a valuable clock had come from a cottar house. Have you any idea how your father came by it?’

‘He said he’d got it at a sale in Findhavon House when old Lord Hay died.’

‘Ah! It must have belonged to the Hay family for many generations – an heirloom, in fact. Lord Hay, of course, died with no near relatives, and the cousin who inherited lived in Australia and gave instructions to sell the lot. Anyway, my friend was fascinated with the clock, especially the initials on the pendulum.’

‘My father had them put on ... his and my mother’s.’

Mr Reid’s eyebrows rose. Geordie Gray had never struck him as being a sentimental type, but it just showed how little one knew of people. ‘It was over a hundred and fifty years old, a true antique. He paid fifteen hundred pounds for the clock and bought the dresser as well.’

‘What would he want with an old dresser? It wasn’t an antique, for Jockie Paul, the cabinet-maker, made it for my father when I was born.’

The solicitor shrugged his shoulders. ‘He said his fellow countrymen go mad over good solid furniture like that. Do you want all the money just now, because I could write you a cheque to cash at ...’

Elspeth’s head was reeling. ‘I’d be terrified to have all that at one time. If you just give me enough to see me through for a few weeks, I’d be grateful.’

‘Shall we say one hundred pounds, then? That’s a nice, round figure.’ He buzzed for his secretary and asked her to get it from the safe, then said, ‘Are you to be living with relatives, Elspeth, now that you no longer have a home?’

‘I’ve nobody left.’ The only blood relative she had now, apart from those she had just left, was her mother’s sister Janet, and hell would have to freeze over before she would go back there.

While they were waiting for the money to be taken through, Mr Reid said, conversationally, ‘John Forrest of Blairton died a few days ago. Would you remember him?’

Her heart had leapt at the name, but it was her John’s father he was speaking about. ‘I never knew Mr Forrest to speak to, just to see in the kirk.’

‘He died last week – the funeral was yesterday – and I had his widow in here earlier this morning asking me to sell the farm for her. She is a very nice, capable woman, but her eyesight is failing badly, unfortunately.’

‘Oh, the poor woman!’ Elspeth’s involuntary exclamation made her mind return to the time of John’s death, when she had said exactly the same thing about his mother. The entrance of the secretary broke into her thoughts, and she accepted the twenty crisp five-pound notes the solicitor counted into her hand.

‘Now remember,’ he said, kindly, rising to see her to the door, ‘just let me know when you need any more.’

In a daze, she walked through the outer office on to the High Street. One hundred pounds would take her any-where she wanted to go, but where did she want to go? With Mrs Forrest fresh in her mind, she remembered the invitation to Blairton which had once been issued, but would John’s mother welcome her after all this time? Elspeth felt a compulsion now to confess to this woman, the only one connected with it who didn’t yet know the truth. Taking no more time to think, she stepped back inside. ‘Could I leave my case here, please? I’ve a call to make, and I don’t want to have to carry it with me.’

The girl behind the glass partition smiled pleasantly. ‘We don’t close until half past five.’

Blairton Farm was two miles from the village and it wasn’t until she neared it that Elspeth’s resolution wavered. What would she do if Mrs Forrest was angry at what she had to say and threw her out? She smiled wryly as the answer came to her – she would be no worse off than she was now.

Striding determinedly up to the farmhouse, she rapped on the back door, but her mouth went dry when she came face to face with the plump, rather tired-looking woman who peered at her through thick-lensed spectacles. ‘Mrs Forrest, it’s Elspeth Full ... Gray. I don’t know if you remember me, but ...’

Meg brightened as she clapped her hand up to her cheek. ‘Well I never! Come in, come in.’

In the kitchen, she went over to the stove. ‘You look fair done in, I’m sure you could do wi’ a cup o’ tea. Now, what brings you to Blairton?’

Recalling the day she had secretly spent in this house, Elspeth found it more difficult than she had thought to speak to this woman from whom she had fled so shame-fully. ‘I’ve a confession to make, Mrs Forrest, and I hope you’ll not think badly of me when you hear it.’

The old lady smiled. ‘I’m sure I’ll not think badly of you, m’dear, whatever you tell me.’

‘I was ... expecting John’s child when he was killed.’

The pupils of Meg’s eyes dilated, but they remained friendly. ‘I should have ken’t that was why you went away, but it never ... you were just a young lassie, and ...’

‘You didn’t think I’d do things like that? We hadn’t long together, but we loved each other, truly we did.’

Meg leaned over and patted her hand. ‘There’s no need to make excuses, m’dear, I’m not condemning you, but I can see you’ve got more than that on your mind, so, when we’ve had our cuppie, we’ll go ben to the parlour, and you’d best tell me the whole story.’

In the room where she and John had made love so madly for a whole day, Elspeth told his mother only of the short time at the fireside in the cottar house and of its dramatic consequences up to the time of her son’s birth, ending by saying, ‘Are you shocked at me now?’

‘Not me. I once spent a whole afternoon wi’ Blairton in my father’s barn, the sweetest hours I ever spent, as Rabbie Burns would say. I was lucky, though, for I didna fall wi’ John till a year after I was wed. So you’d a boy, and all?’

Elspeth gave a long sigh. ‘I havena finished yet.’ She went on to tell the rest, her voice quivering when she revealed the anguish she had gone through before making her decision to leave John with the Watsons.

‘Don’t blame yourself for that, lass,’ Meg said, softly, ‘you couldna have done anything else without telling your man he was your bairn.’ Pursing her lips for a second, she added, ‘Mind you, it would have been best if you had tell’t him.’