Part 46 (2/2)

Chapter Twenty-seven.

'What are you doing?' Nell yelled from the kitchen as Hope opened the front door and a squall of icy rain blew in. 'You can't go out, it's pitch dark and you'll catch your death of cold.'

But Hope could hear nothing but the voice inside her head telling her to run.

Once out on the road she ran headlong down the hill. The driving rain was so heavy that she was soaked to the skin within seconds and she lost one of her slippers in thick mud, but all she was aware of was her own misery and the need to end it.

The day had begun with torrential rain, and Hope had a sinking feeling that such weather on the day of Lady Harvey's funeral was a portent of worse things to come.

The cab which took her and Nell to Compton Dando had a leaky roof, and by the time they'd got to the church both she and Nell were wet through. Their umbrella blew inside out in the high wind as they got out of the cab and the church was so cold their teeth were soon chattering.

The church was full, the front few pews all taken up by gentry, some of whom Hope recognized as people who had called at Briargate in the past. Nell whispered that the rest were Dorvilles, Lady Harvey's family from Suss.e.x, most of whom she'd met on her trips down there.

But the bulk of the congregation were ordinary people from the surrounding villages and their wet clothes created a steamy, evil-smelling fug. Hope recognized a great many faces from her childhood. The Nicholses, the Webbs, Boxes, Pearces, and Calways, all so much older now and all looking as cold and uncomfortable as she herself felt.

Rufus, Matt, Joe and Henry carried the coffin in on their shoulders, Rufus's blond hair standing out like a beacon against the Renton darkness. The wreath of holly and Christmas roses on the top of the coffin seemed to Hope to be too stark for Lady Harvey, who had always favoured flamboyant flowers. But she had to suppose that in December it wasn't possible to get anything more colourful.

The Reverend Gosling seemed to have shrunk since Hope last sawhim and his voice was quavery and uncertain throughout the service. When he spoke of Lady Harvey it was as if he had no memory of when she was a young and vivacious woman, but had only met her after Briargate was burned down when she was frail and disturbed.

Even the hymns were gloomy, tuneless ones, which Hope knew Rufus would never have chosen.

Hope had not expected to be uplifted by this service, yet she had thought she'd gain some kind of comfort that her true mother's earthly struggles were over, and that she had gone on to a better place. But there was no comfort in this cold, pitiless rite, not even a few well-chosen words spoken with some emotion by a family member.

When they moved outside for the interment, the strong wind, driving rain, and the mud underfoot made most of the village people scurry for the shelter of the Crown Inn without so much as a thought for the final words at the graveside. Hope saw Rufus's desolate expression and she knew he felt his mother had been slighted.

Hope herself was emotionally confused for she wasn't sure which camp she belonged in. She was aware that many of the village people had already lost a day's wages to come and pay their last respects to Lady Harvey; to also expect them to risk their health by standing in pouring rain was perhaps asking too much. Yet she was very disappointed as she had expected, and perhaps needed, to see a huge outpouring of grief from everyone today. But to want that seemed ridiculous; she'd scarcely shed a tear herself, and in fact only the previous night she'd been nasty enough to remark that she sawno good reason why anyone in the village should attend the funeral.

Nell had been outraged at that, but Hope had pointed out that Lady Harvey had never done anything for the villagers, not even back in the days when she and Sir William had been wealthy.

Yet the sight of the yawning grave, already half-full of rainwater, suddenly made her feel utterly bereft. Taking Nell's arm firmly, she drew her through the ranks of women holding black-edged handkerchiefs to their eyes and ignored their sharp, disapproving looks. Maybe they didn't think anyone but gentry should come so close to the grave, but Hope felt she and Nell had the right to be among the chief mourners.

As the Reverend Gosling intoned the last words of the burial service, Hope looked down at the polished oak coffin with its bra.s.s handles and plaque bearing the inscription 'Lady Anne Harvey, 18061855', and thought of the burials in the Crimea. There were no coffins for those brave men; often their boots and clothing were s.n.a.t.c.hed before they were even cold. They would be shoved unceremoniously into ma.s.s graves, the only marking a roughly made cross which would probably be lost in the first storm. Bennett, who had spent his whole life caring for others, might be in such a grave, while Lady Harvey could sleep for eternity next to her husband, marked by a marble headstone.

Hope was reminded too of the day they buried Meg and Silas Renton and how abandoned and angry she had felt then. Their grave was over by the churchyard wall, next to Prudence and Violet, with only the smallest and simplest of headstones. She remembered with a pang of conscience that she always felt jealous when Meg came here to put flowers on the children's grave.

Yet the incident which set off Hope's rage came later. Lady Harvey's two sisters were standing in the shelter of the lychgate waiting for their carriage and Nell went over to them to offer her condolences. To Hope's astonishment and outrage, they brushed her aside as if she were a beggar asking for money.

To Hope it was unbelievable they could be so callous as Nell had met the sisters before on innumerable occasions and had even attended both their parents' funerals. Hope almost ripped into them, telling them that Nell had been far more than a loyal servant, she was also Lady Harvey's one true friend. But angry as she was, she was aware that once she started she might very well follow it up with a loud proclamation that she was in fact their niece. Knowing that such an admission would only distress Rufus, Nell and her other brothers, she forced herself to turn her back on those women and lead Nell away.

The wake was being held at Hunstrete House, and it was very clear that common folk like the Rentons wouldn't be welcome there. Rufus came running after them as they made for their waiting cab to go home, but Hope told him they had to get back for Betsy.

The bleakness in his eyes told her he understood the real reason they were leaving, and she urged him to go back to his relatives for a while, then perhaps join them later at Willow End.

The journey back seemed endless, and when they reached the mill at Chewton the river had burst its banks, flooding the road. The horse was reluctant to go through the swirling water at first, and Hope had visions of being forced to retreat and take the long way home. But fortunately he moved with a touch of the whip, and eventually they arrived home, very wet and chilled to the bone.

Betsy was screaming fit to burst because she hadn't liked the milk Dora had tried to give her while they were out, and she latched on to her mother's breast like a leech before Hope could even change her wet clothes. And Nell kept going on and on about the funeral and the sisters who had been so hurtful.

'I shouldn't have spoken to them,' she said with a quiver in her voice. 'It was my own fault, they probably blame me for everything as Albert was my husband. Of course they wouldn't have wanted the likes of us up at Hunstrete.'

'What on earth do you mean by ”the likes of us”?' Hope snapped indignantly. 'We are all better mannered than that stuck-up lot. Sir William took Albert on, it was he who allowed the man to run the place, and therefore his own fault things went badly. I despise those sort of people who do they think they are? I pity poor Rufus having to suffer an hour or two with them, he'd have been better off in the Crown with our boys who at least care about him.'

'I saw them all looking at Matt, Joe and Henry. They didn't think it was fitting they were carrying her coffin.'

'Are they numbskulls?' Hope exploded. 'Matt rescued Lady Harvey from the burning house, all three of them spent the whole night trying to put out the fire, and they've done countless jobs for her without ever expecting payment. Who could be more fitting? And who else would have done it? Most of that family are too decrepit to wipe their own backsides.'

'You mustn't say things like that,' Nell exclaimed. 'You should showthem some respect.'

Hope launched into a bitter tirade about the upper cla.s.ses, including the fools of officers she'd met out in the Crimea. It was only when Nell began to cry that she stomped off to her bedroom with Betsy. But she had no intention of apologizing to Nell, for why should she? It was all true.

It seemed to her that she had no 'place'. She had got too much spirit and fire to be anyone's lackey, and she couldn't ever pa.s.s for gentry because of how she'd been brought up. Even if Rufus was to acknowledge her publicly as his sister, that wouldn't change anything. They would just tag 'b.a.s.t.a.r.d' on to her name, 'fly blow', or any of the other ugly words they used for illegitimate children. The Dorvilles wouldn't want to be a.s.sociated with her, and after seeing them today she wouldn't want to lay claim to being related to them anyway.

If Bennett did come home and set up a practice away from here she would probably be accepted as 'the middling sort', but she doubted her ability to accept the narrow confines of that kind of life either.

She had seen and done things few women could even imagine. How could she settle down in a neat little house with lace at the windows and a maid doing all the ch.o.r.es? She wasn't cut out to spend her days doing embroidery and receiving visits from dull women who could only talk about the price of fish, or the latest fas.h.i.+on.

The walls seemed to close in on her then. She had been glad to leave the Crimea; being reunited with her brothers and sisters was everything she expected, and bringing Betsy into the world in a clean, safe place had been wonderful. But now it all seemed so empty.

She put Betsy down to sleep, and stood at the crib watching her. She wasn't as dark as Hope now, nor yet as fair as Bennett. The slightly uptilted nose came from her, but she had a very solemn look most of the time, just like Bennett.

Icy fear gripped Hope as she contemplated that Betsy might never know her father. That year after year she would have to look at her daughter's face and be reminded of all she'd lost.

This time last year she and Bennett had climbed up the slippery steep path to the Heights with baskets on their backs packed with dressings, bandages and medicines for the field hospital. She could remember how the icy wind had stung her face, that she was hungry and lice-ridden, but Bennett had kept turning to her, holding out his hand to help her over the worst places, telling her that it was imperative they made it up there because men were dying for want of these precious items.

It was the most wretched she'd ever felt in her entire life, but with Bennett leading the way, urging her onwards, she made it to the top. Later, when they'd finally staggered into the field hospital and seen the relief on those gaunt, pain-filled faces, she had felt it had all been worth the struggle.

She couldn't have made it up there without him, and she couldn't bring Betsy up without him either. Without him she was nothing and no use to anyone.

Unable to breathe because the room suddenly seemed so hot and stuffy, she knew she had to get out of the house immediately.

Hope's second slipper disappeared into the mud unnoticed as she ran full tilt down the road in the direction of Bath, and she kept running blindly until she was down on the flat, past the last of the cottages.

Way over to her right and up on the hill was a big house, lamplight in the windows twinkling in the darkness. To her left were the meadows which the train from Bristol to London pa.s.sed through, and beyond that the river Avon. By day, in the suns.h.i.+ne, it was beautiful, but seen in darkness it felt threatening.

She was almost at the crossroads by the Globe Inn when a st.i.tch in her side forced her to slowdown, and at once total desolation washed over her.

Bennett was never coming home, she had just been fooling herself that he might. The only future ahead of her was that of a lonely widow, dependent on the charity of others. She began to sob, all the images of the life she and Bennett had planned together streaming through her head as if to mock her for ever believing they would come true.

They would never live in a cosy cottage with poorer patients paying Bennett with a chicken or a few eggs; they would never sit outside in the moonlight on warm summer nights, or pull their children on a sledge through the snow. Never again would she know the bliss of lovemaking, or wake to find Bennett holding her in his arms. It was all a foolish fantasy; in real life people didn't get what they wanted.

Lady Harvey loved Angus but she had to live out her life with a man who wanted other men. She'd even died without knowing her daughter didn't hate her for what she'd done. Rufus might marry Lily, but he'd have years when his crops would fail, chickens wouldn't lay and they'd go hungry. Nell would never have a baby of her own. Matt would never be rich. Even das.h.i.+ng, handsome Angus had not got what he wanted. He might come home to find he had a daughter, but that wasn't going to make up for Lady Harvey being dead.

She felt she was back to the night Albert had thrown her out of the gatehouse, the same feeling of despair overwhelming her, the same icy rain mingling with her tears. She'd forced herself to survive then, ever the optimist that things would get better. But she knew better now: life was just one long series of calamities until you died.

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