Calico Road (3 page)

Old John had had nothing to do with the two newcomers, not even speaking to Marjorie in the mill. He charged them the same rent as anyone else and left her to cope as best she could. He was, folk sniggered, too busy with his new bride and, ten months later, with his new son, to go after women as he had before.

Marjorie had continued to work in the new spinning mill Greenhalgh had built. Her hard work earned people’s respect and, though she might have slipped up once, she never associated with a fellow again and was a regular attender at church. But she never talked about her past or her family, not even to Toby.

As the baby grew into a lad the resemblance to John Greenhalgh showed up so clearly that you couldn’t doubt who’d fathered him – and the resemblance to his half-brother Jethro was remarkable. They could have been twins. So Marjorie explained to Toby that Mr Greenhalgh was his father too, but that he was bastard born and must never speak to the mill owner or expect anything of him.

Jethro, the legitimate son, was carefully guarded, though from what he needed protecting people never could work out. He went away to a fancy school for the sons of gentlemen when he was ten and he talked differently from the Backenshaw folk because of his lady mother. He kept away from Toby, even crossing the street to avoid him, but that didn’t stop the resemblance between them from continuing to astonish other people.

Until today’s summons John Greenhalgh had not even nodded to his natural son in the street, but the old man had attended Marjorie’s simple funeral when Toby was eighteen, or at least someone from the big house had turned up in a shiny new carriage, sitting there with the blinds pulled down but not getting out to join the other mourners. Mind you, they could have just sent an empty carriage as a mark of respect. Toby wouldn’t put anything past the tricky old sod in the big house. But at least they’d allowed him to keep the cottage which was the only home he’d ever known.

When he got to Parkside, the Greenhalghs’ stone-built mansion, the young man hesitated for a moment then walked up to the front door. If Old John wanted to see him, he’d let him into the house this way or Toby wouldn’t go in at all.

The maid who answered looked down her nose at him till he said who he was, then her frown turned to a more welcoming expression and she gestured him inside.

‘They’re expecting you, sir. If you’ll just wait here in the hall for a minute or two, I’ll send word up to the master.’

She’d called him
sir
, Toby thought with a wry grimace. Eh, he’d gone up in the world. No one had ever called him that before. Probably wouldn’t again, either. Clutching his hat in his hands he stared round, taking in everything he could because it would likely be the only time he saw the inside of this place. It was just as people had said, a bloody palace. He felt angry at such a display of wealth. It wasn’t right that one man should own so much when others were clemming for lack of food.

The maid came back. ‘If you’ll follow me, sir, I’ll show you up to the master’s bedroom. Shall I take your hat?’

‘Nay, I can carry it mesen, thanks.’

He trod up the stairs in her wake, amazed by how soft and thick the carpet was – even his clumsy boots made hardly a sound – and how beautiful the woodwork was. It had a patina so fine he’d have liked to stroke the polished surfaces and examine the pieces of furniture he passed to see how they were made.

She opened a door. ‘Please go in, sir.’

He paused to take a deep breath and square his shoulders before entering a room so big he was surprised to see it was only a bedroom. He and his mother had shared one only a quarter the size of this for years, dividing it with an old sheet hung over a rope, for modesty’s sake. Since her death that bedroom had been his alone, which was something of a luxury in a village where ten people might have to share a two-roomed cottage.

When he looked across at the bed he forgot everything else in his shock. It was as if he was seeing the ghost of John Greenhalgh, so thin and white was the man lying there. The resemblance between Toby and his natural father had always been very noticeable, even when the old man was plump with good health. Now, it seemed to shout at him from that thin, pale face.

John stared back at him, eyes alive with intelligence though the rest of him lay so still you’d almost think he’d died already. His face was grey-white and his lips hardly marked by colour except for a faint bluish tinge.

‘Toby Fletcher,’ he said, the first words he’d ever spoken directly to his natural son.

Toby nodded but said nothing. He stayed where he was, uncertain what was expected of him.

‘Come closer to the bed where I can see you properly.’

He moved forward, trying not to show how the room overwhelmed him, for it made him feel small, he who stood six foot three and was noted for his broad, muscular shoulders.

‘Thank you for coming,’ John went on in that husky thread of a voice.

‘They said you were dying. I’d not have come else.’

A younger man standing in the shadows to one side of the bed let out an angry choke of sound at this bluntness and took a quick step forward. Without turning his head, John said, ‘You’ll stay silent, Jethro, or leave the room.’

Breathing heavily, casting a furious glance in Toby’s direction, the man stepped back again.

His half-brother, Toby thought, surprised by a sudden feeling of amusement. A couple of years younger than him and a couple of inches shorter, but with almost the same face – a damned Greenhalgh face. This family looked down their noses at ordinary folk nowadays, though John’s father had been a handloom weaver and there were whispers that John himself had not made his early money honestly. The mill he’d built had thrived, though, and he’d been a model citizen ever since he opened it. Backenshaw had thrived too, and was now almost big enough to be called a town.

‘You’re a Greenhalgh all right,’ John said slowly, each word seeming an effort. He glanced sideways at his son, who was still scowling. ‘No use denying what anyone with eyes can see, Jethro. You and he look so alike and—’ He broke off, coughing feebly and gesturing towards a glass of water.

A manservant stepped forward to lift him up and help him drink. As he settled back against his pillows John gave Toby a wry smile. ‘I asked you here because I’ve not long left to live. We all come to it. Neither rich nor poor can escape death.’

‘It seems to me the rich escape it for longer than the poor do,’ Toby said, remembering another death bed and a woman whose love for him had shone in her eyes until the light went out of them forever.

John nodded agreement. ‘You’re right. But for all our money, we still come to it in the end. My money couldn’t save my wife when she fell ill.’ He paused to gather his breath. ‘I brought you here because – I find I cannot die in peace unless I do something for you, Toby Fletcher. You are, after all, my son.’

Another mutter from behind him and Jethro scowled across the room at Toby, who scowled right back, before turning to his father and saying sharply, ‘I need nowt from you. I can make my own way in the world. The only time I’ve wanted owt from you was when my mother lay dying. I knocked on that big front door of yours to seek help for her and got turned away.’ He’d been distraught at the thought of losing her. Eh, to think she’d been gone eight years! But there wasn’t a day passed that he didn’t remember her fondly.

‘I was in London, didn’t find out about Marjorie until it was too late to help her. I’m sorry about that. I did attend the funeral.’

That silenced Toby. So it had been
him
behind the carriage blinds.

‘It’s I who need something from you now, Toby.’

He stared across at the bed in puzzlement then gestured round the room. ‘How can someone like you need owt from me?’

The dying man was betrayed into a spurt of laughter, which made him choke so that he had to be given another drink of water. ‘I was wrong to do nothing for you and Marjorie. I need to make up for that now – if I’m to go in peace. So I beg you to accept what I offer.’

Angry words of refusal welled up in Toby’s throat, but the habit of years made him hold them back. Bastards like him soon learned not to make bad worse by taking offence easily, because unlike other lads they’d no father or brothers to stand up for them. And even when he’d used his superior strength to make his point, he’d got into trouble for it, which had upset his mother. So he’d learned to control his anger and use words and humour instead of blows to calm down a situation. ‘What did you have in mind?’

‘I’m thinking of giving you a piece of land and a small inn. Will you accept them from me?’

Toby waited. He wasn’t going to leap at the offer like a greedy puppy snapping at food. Did the old devil really mean it? Eh, it’d have been sweet to toss the offer back and tell Old John to keep his bloody inn. But it’d have been stupid, too – and Toby had never considered himself stupid. This was his big chance in life, so he wasn’t going to throw it away. It was an effort to force the necessary words out, though. ‘Aye. I’ll accept them.’

‘I knew he would,’ Jethro sneered.

‘Then you knew more than me,’ his father said. ‘I’m pleased, but can I ask why, Toby? You’ve always been very independent and you refused my offer of a job in the mill.’

He shrugged and told the truth. ‘I’ll accept because I’m not a fool. Because it’ll make me my own man, an’ who’d not welcome that? Where is it, this inn of yours?’

‘Up near the tops on Calico Road. The inn’s called the Packhorse. The village is called Calico too because they used to weave the cloth there.’

Toby had heard of the place but never been there, for it was a fair distance from Backenshaw, two or three hours’ walk.

‘I warn you, it’s a strange place,’ John continued. ‘The folk up there are independent to a fault and pride themselves on being moor folk and better than townies, so you’ll have to earn acceptance by them.’

Toby smiled. ‘I like it on the moors.’ The space and freedom up there seemed to free his soul from the weight of other people and he often went for a walk outside the village on fine Sundays to breathe the tangy, bracing air, so different from the smoky air of Backenshaw itself. And if the folk at Calico were surly at first with him, he felt sure they’d accept him after a while because he usually got on well with people of all sorts, which was why his employer often sent him out to do repairs to the houses of the better sort of customer.

Eh, to be your own man, to call no one ‘master’! Was it really going to happen to him?

For what seemed a very long time the man in the bed looked across at him and there was no reading his expression. Then he nodded. ‘Good. Make something of the place. Make me and your mother proud of you.’

Toby chose his words carefully. ‘I’ll make good use of it, you can be sure.’

John sighed and closed his eyes. ‘You’ll need to see my lawyer. He’s waiting with the papers in the library. Once you’ve signed them the place is yours. You can write, can’t you?’

‘Aye.’

The old man held out his hand.

Impelled by he knew not what, Toby went across to the bed, took the limp hand and held it in his for a few moments, before laying it gently down on the bed again. He didn’t speak or look back as he left the room. What was there to say? They hardly knew one another and it was far too late now to remedy that.

You can write, can’t you?
The words rang in his ears as he went down the stairs and he could feel his cheeks going warm from shame. He knew the alphabet, could write his name and read a few simple words, but that was all. He was better with figures and could calculate how much wood was needed for a job as well as folk with fancy schooling, but he’d been too busy earning his daily bread, even as a small lad, to go to school regularly. That had upset his mother, but he’d been stubborn, going after money to put bread on the table because as she grew older she hadn’t always enjoyed good health and they’d had some hard times.

He followed the same maid down the stairs and into a room lined with so many books that he stopped in astonishment near the door. He hadn’t known there were this many books in all of Lancashire! A man clad in black looked up from a table near the window and gestured him across.

‘You’re accepting the gift from Mr Greenhalgh then, Mr Fletcher?’

‘Aye.’

‘You’ll need to read this before you sign it.’

Toby took the folded piece of paper, looked at how long the words on it were and handed it back. ‘You’ll have to read it to me. I can read simple stuff, but I can’t understand long words like those.’ No doubt the man would report that to the Greenhalghs and then his damned brother would laugh at him. At that moment Toby vowed to learn to read properly and never shame himself like this again.

He listened to what the lawyer said, asking several questions till he thought he understood the meaning of the deed of gift. There was only one condition: he was to provide a free pot of beer for his half-brother every January. He’d have laughed at that piece of foolishness if the lawyer hadn’t been so solemn-faced.

As he signed the papers, Toby felt relieved that at least he could pen his name without hesitation. He looked at the space where his father had signed, surprised as always by the way you spelled Greenhalgh. Why the ‘gh’ at the end should be spoken like ‘sh’ he’d never understood. He’d seen the word in big letters on the side of the mill all his life and when he started learning his letters had asked the teacher why, but the man had grown cross at being interrupted and said it wasn’t for him to question how his betters spoke their names.

The lawyer cleared his throat and Toby realised he’d been lost in his thoughts. He put the quill down and sat back, watching as a manservant and the housekeeper were brought in to witness both signatures.

When he walked out of the house holding his copy of the deed to the inn, he held his head high, shame at his inability to read easily forgotten because he owned land now. It was probably stony and barren if it was up in one of the V-shaped valleys moor folk called cloughs, but it was land nonetheless. The inn was called the Packhorse. Toby liked that name and hoped it looked out over the lower valleys so that he could watch the world, not be hemmed in by other buildings as he was in Backenshaw.