Going Home (24 page)

‘I couldn’t bear the smell.’ Phoebe wrinkled her nose. ‘It was appalling.’

‘But we were so pleased to come back here, Mrs Linton. The air is so good and we both agreed, Phoebe and I, that we feel very much at home at Elmswell Manor. But,’ Mrs Boyle turned to her hostess with regret, ‘we do not wish to outstay our welcome. You have been very kind and hospitable, but we must soon be on our way again.’

‘Please don’t think that you cannot stay longer,’ Emily Linton assured her. ‘You are very welcome indeed, and especially whilst Ralph and Mr Mungo are here. We are such a happy party.’

Mrs Boyle glanced at Phoebe, who gave her an imploring look and said, ‘Please don’t make me go back to Hampshire, Mama. I shall die of boredom.’

When the young people had gone for one last stroll in the gardens before dark, Mrs Boyle, in a sudden burst of confidence, said, ‘Phoebe doesn’t wish to go to my brother’s house because his wife is planning balls and outings in order to find her a husband. In a moment of weakness I told my sister-in-law that that was what my husband said I must do.’

‘Oh, but I thought that there was an understanding between your daughter and Ralph!’
Emily Linton expressed surprise. ‘Am I mistaken?’

‘I am afraid so.’ Mrs Boyle shook her head in mild exasperation. ‘It is Phoebe’s fault. She led me to understand, some weeks before we left Australia, that they were fond of one another.’ She sighed. ‘But I rather feel that she may have misled me. But in any case,’ she gave an even deeper sigh, ‘her father would not allow it.’

‘Because he is a convict’s son?’ Emily said quietly.

‘Yes.’ Mrs Boyle straightened her shoulders. ‘Though I find it disagreeable to say so, I’m very much afraid that Captain Boyle has ideas even above his own station. Money and title is what he is looking for for our daughter, and a lady of distinction for our son. He will be disappointed, I fear.’ She looked frankly at her hostess. ‘I have said this to no-one else, Mrs Linton, but my husband is an upstart and anyone of rank or quality will recognize that.’

Emily Linton took in a quick astonished breath but Mrs Boyle continued. ‘Of course, I too want the best for my children. Should Phoebe marry Ralph Hawkins she would want for nothing material, for the Hawkins are very wealthy. But she would have no status.’

‘She would have love and kindness,’ Emily murmured.

‘I have no doubt that she would.’ Mrs Boyle gave a sad smile. ‘But that would not be considered important in my husband’s eyes, he
knows nothing of such things.’ She lowered her eyes. ‘And as for Edwin; he is of age, he must make the best of his life.’

Jack was still confined to his bed and as Amelia walked in the garden with Phoebe and Ralph, she decided that she would write to the Fielding sisters after all and ask their opinion on the dilemma of Moira. She also decided to discuss the situation with Phoebe and Ralph.

‘I shall visit Hull again in a day or two to try to resolve this business of Moira. I shall take her some clean clothes and some soap and one or two things from the kitchen, and try to talk to her mother.’

‘You can’t go alone Amelia,’ Ralph asserted. ‘That’s out of the question.’

‘But of course I can!’ she said sharply. ‘Now that I have seen the place, although it is very dirty it did not seem threatening. I shall be perfectly all right. I won’t stay long,’ she assured him.

‘I’ll come with you, if you like, Amelia,’ Phoebe said lazily.

‘No,’ Ralph insisted. ‘Neither of you must go, not unless someone is with you. Wait a day or two until Jack is well and we will both come.’

‘No!’ Amelia answered. ‘It is very kind of you both to offer, but we will be a crowd and neither Moira nor her mother would be willing to speak to me in such circumstances. I shall go alone.’

‘What an exasperating person you are, cousin,
when you won’t listen to reason.’ Ralph scowled. ‘You will be taking your life in your hands!’

‘What nonsense,’ she said crossly. ‘Of course I won’t!’

‘Excuse me!’ Ralph, tight-lipped, gave a small bow. ‘I must have a word with Jack before he goes to sleep.’

‘Oh dear!’ Phoebe gave a wry smile as Ralph left them and hurried back to the house. ‘I’m afraid you have upset him.’

Amelia stared after him. ‘Well, I can’t help that. He must take me as he finds me.’ Then she remembered her manners. ‘Do forgive me, Phoebe. I had no wish to embroil you in this matter, but I do feel very strongly about it, I thought Ralph would understand that.’

Phoebe looked quizzically at her, then took her arm and turned her around so that they were walking back to the house. ‘I’m quite sure that he does. He is concerned for your safety, that is all.’

‘He is infuriating! Do you not find him so?’

Phoebe didn’t answer, but gave a little chuckle.

‘Oh,’ Amelia remembered and was suddenly stricken with guilt, ‘I’m sorry. Of course you do not! You are to be affianced, are you not? I do beg your pardon.’

‘No, Amelia, we are not. We do not have an understanding, although Mama thinks that we do and perhaps Ralph thought so too.’

‘How is that so?’

‘Because I said so,’ Phoebe said cheerfully and then shrugged. ‘But I didn’t mean it, it was merely a whim.’

‘But if Ralph thinks – he will be upset when he discovers that you don’t care for him.’

‘But I do care for him,’ Phoebe assured her. ‘He is a splendid fellow. But I’m not going to marry him. I would make his life a misery. He is so well meaning that he would give me everything I wanted and I would become more and more selfish and he would end up hating me.’

Amelia frowned. Ralph a splendid fellow? Phoebe’s opinion did not correspond with her own judgement. She has known him for so long that she does not see him as he really is, outspoken and arrogant!

‘Amelia is the most infuriating woman I have ever come across.’ Ralph stared down from Jack’s window as Amelia and Phoebe walked back across the lawn. ‘She will not take advice.’

Jack blew his nose vigorously. ‘Really? And how could you be the considered judge of that when you never take it either?’

Ralph turned towards the bed where Jack lay propped up on pillows. ‘I? I always listen to reason! When do I not?’

Jack didn’t answer and Ralph continued. ‘She is nothing like Phoebe who always listens and doesn’t argue.’

Jack laughed and gave a husky cough. ‘Phoebe
never
listens, although she pretends to, and she
doesn’t argue because she has already made up her mind or opinion.’

‘How do you know that?’ Ralph was puzzled as to how Jack could come to that conclusion.

‘I just know, that’s all.’ Jack slithered further between the sheets. ‘Phoebe knows what she wants.’ He smiled. His eyes were shiny and Ralph thought that he looked feverish. ‘And she will get it.’

Ralph turned to the window again and watched the two figures below. Amelia kept her head lowered but Phoebe looked up and gave him a wave. ‘I don’t think she wants me,’ he murmured dismally. ‘I thought she did, but I am having doubts. I think she will succumb to family pressure and marry title. Someone poor but noble, not a rich barbarian like me.’

‘I keep telling you. She is not for you, my friend.’ Jack’s voice was low. ‘Phoebe will settle for a lesser man than you.’

‘There is no-one less than me, Jack.’ Ralph’s voice was barely audible. ‘I have the stain of scandal and disgrace hanging over me. I have never before thought of myself as base-born but that is what I am. My mother had murderous inclinations and I believe my father – if father he is – to be a liar and a cheat. I have no proof of that but that is what I believe.’

Jack sat up in bed. ‘Get up off your knees! I don’t like what I hear,’ he croaked. ‘You are the same man you always were. The one I have always known.’ He searched for his handkerchief
beneath his pillow, and blew his nose again. ‘When I am out of bed we will go to York once more and confront this man Scott. We will settle this matter once and for all.’

‘Excuse me, Mrs Linton.’ Ginny gazed round at the assembled company in the breakfast room. Mrs Linton, Mrs Boyle, Miss Boyle, Mr Hawkins, Miss May, Lily. Jack was having breakfast in bed and Roger was already out on the estate with Sam. ‘May I ask who is accompanying Miss Linton?’

‘Accompanying her where, Ginny?’ Mrs Linton looked up with a smile. ‘I assumed she had slept late.’

‘No, ma’am. She apparently took the trap very early and told the stable lad she was driving into Hull. He was supposed to give me a message to give to you, to say she would be back later in the day. Only he forgot.’ She folded her arms in front of her chest. ‘He has been chastised, ma’am, you may be sure of that.’

‘But why would she go into Hull on her own?’ Emily Linton put a nervous hand to her throat. ‘It’s such a long lonely road.’

‘Don’t fret, Mrs Linton,’ Ginny placated her though she herself looked anxious. ‘She won’t come to any harm on ’road. There’ll be plenty of farmers and travellers driving in to ’market. But I don’t understand why she’s gone on her own when one of ’maids could have gone in with her.’

‘I think I can explain, Aunt Emily.’ Ralph
glanced at Phoebe who nodded in agreement. ‘Amelia wanted to visit the young Irish girl, to take her some food and clothing. Phoebe – Miss Boyle and I offered to go with her, but she said she preferred to go alone.’

‘But that is unthinkable! How very annoying of Amelia.’ Mrs Linton rose from the table. ‘Excuse me, Mrs Boyle. I must find Roger or one of the men to go after her.’

‘I’ll go, Aunt Emily. If I can borrow a mount I can be off in ten minutes. I know where she has gone,’ Ralph added, ‘and Roger doesn’t.’

‘Would you?’ The strain eased on her face. ‘I would be grateful. It is foolish of me, I know, but sometimes bad memories come back to haunt me.’ She clasped her hands together. ‘I wish Philip was here.’

Ralph took her hands in his and bent to kiss her cheek. ‘Don’t worry, Aunt Emily. Amelia will come to no harm. She is well able to take care of herself.’

It was a fine morning and except for his annoyance at Amelia for causing her mother distress, he enjoyed the ride into Hull. The hawthorn blossom was almost gone but the creamy, fuzzy heads of the elder scented the air and in the hedgerows, bees buzzed amongst the pale pink dog rose.

I could live here, he mused, gazing across the waving pale heads of corn. It is softer, more gentle than home, not so extreme, yet it has a sweeping remote landscape which soothes and
pacifies, and indeed as he cantered along the road he felt more at peace with himself than he had for some time.

He left his mount with a stable lad at the Cross Keys inn. He had remembered the golden statue of King William just across from it, and so took his bearings from there to look for Amelia. It was then that he also remembered his mother, Meg, speaking of the Hull Market Place and he paused briefly to look as if through her eyes, so that he could tell her of it on his return.

She spoke of King Billy with such affection, he recalled, and had told him that she had often sat beneath his feet. He looked up at the gleaming edifice and a lump came to his throat. What a hard life she must have led, and Da too, he saw the Holderness countryside when he was a mere boy, just as I did today as a man. I must tell them of what it means to me.

He walked towards the Holy Trinity church and cut through the crush of market stalls which were gathered around it. He went across Trinity House Lane where the Marine School which had educated Captain Linton was situated, and towards the street of Whitefriargate where he stopped to ascertain his whereabouts.

Somewhere around here, he mused. Do I turn left or right? Right, he decided, and set off once more. He found the alleyway without any difficulty and was halfway down it when he heard the sound. At first he thought it was cats, but then realized that there was a child crying,
several voices shouting and above it all a woman wailing.

He started to hurry and turned into the courtyard, his heart hammering for fear of what he might find. A group of women stood there, all poorly clad. All had shawls over their heads and most had small grey-faced children clinging to their skirts. One had a very young baby in her arms who was crying fretfully. They turned as one as he entered the courtyard and he felt their hostility.

‘Be off with ye,’ said one. ‘We’re in mourning here. The likes of ye are not welcome.’ She had a strong Irish accent and she stared him defiantly in the face. He glanced at them in turn. Some, he thought, looked defeated, but others clenched their fists in a menacing manner.

‘I’m not collecting or wanting money,’ he said placatingly. ‘I’m looking for someone who might be in trouble. A lady,’ he said.

One of them guffawed. ‘A lady! We’re all ladies and we’re all in trouble. In God’s name have we ever known anything else?’

‘She was looking for a girl called Moira,’ he persisted and searched his memory for the girl’s surname, but couldn’t remember it. ‘She’s Irish, lives with her mother, up there.’ He pointed to the upper floor of one of the dwellings.

‘We all live up there, mister,’ said the woman who had first spoken to him. ‘Three families to a room, men, women and children all sharing. Sure, such luxury as ye’d never dream of.’

‘There is a lady up there.’ A woman, younger than the others, spoke quietly to him. ‘She’s talking to Moira’s ma. She’s just lost one of her bairns.’ She looked up. ‘That’s her ye can hear keening. We’ve come out so’s to give her some air.’

‘Can I go up?’

‘I supppose so.’ She shrugged and looked at the other women, but they turned their backs on him.

He trod carefully up the stairs and wondered how many had fallen and broken their limbs, especially the women who carried children. He called as he reached the first landing but then heard the keening from the floor above. There was no air and a stink of stale food, urine, and unwashed bodies emanated from each doorway that he passed.

‘Amelia!’ He called again. ‘Amelia!’

He heard chair legs scraping on a wooden floor and then the swish of skirts. Amelia appeared in a doorway. She took a deep breath when she saw him and put her hand to her forehead. Her face was pale and she looked quite distraught.