Still Waters (30 page)

Tess had been frozen with shock, breathless with it, but suddenly she became galvanised; she had to get away from that hateful voice, that sneering face! She set off across the graveyard, stumbling through the wild, wet grass.

‘I’m going home,’ she shouted over her shoulder, her voice wobbly with tears. ‘Home to the Old House. Tell Freddy I’m sorry, I c-can’t stay.’

She ran. Through the wet grass, past the big old church, over the wet gravel. Ashley caught up with her under the lychgate and grabbed her, refused to let go even when she kicked and fought like a wildcat. He was white, his reddish-brown eyes round, scared.

‘Tess, I’m sorry, but it doesn’t matter, it isn’t important! She was just a silly girl a long time ago . . . everyone knows the story, I didn’t think you’d mind. I’ve – I’ve made a fool of myself, but I do like you so much . . . please don’t hate me, I didn’t mean . . . didn’t realise . . .’

‘She was my
mother
,’ Tess screamed at him, suddenly too furious to care what anyone thought. ‘And that poor sucker was my
father,
damn your eyes! And I didn’t know
anything
until you told me and I’ll hate you for as long as I live and I won’t, I won’t, stay under the same roof as you, I don’t care how rude everyone thinks me!’

‘Your
mother
?’ Leonora was your
mother
? B-but you’re called Delamere, she was a Meadowes, everyone knows that, so she can’t be . . .’

Tess slapped his face hard. He rocked back on his heels, looking stunned. She slapped his face again, twice, the slaps cracking like pistol shots.

‘Her married name was Delamere,’ she shrieked. ‘Women take their husbands’ names when they marry, or didn’t you know that? You poor ignorant bloody snob, didn’t you know even that? And now let go of me or I’ll claw your bloody eyes out!’

He hung on. Grimly. Still frightened by what he had done. She saw the fear in his eyes, naked and ashamed. She tried to wrestle herself free but he wouldn’t let go and he kept imploring her to forgive him, to let him make it up to her.

‘I didn’t know, honestly,’ he said, his voice cracking with sincerity. ‘I swear on the bible that I didn’t know. Let me . . .’

‘No! No, no,
no
!’ Tess shouted. She wasn’t crying any more, she was too angry. ‘If you don’t let me go I’ll kill you!’

‘Look, you can’t walk back to your home and there’s no one there anyway . . . Please, Tess, listen to me! If I promise . . .’

She jerked herself out of his grip then and ran. Away from the road, and civilisation and people. Wildly, without thinking, she tore through the churchyard and into the trees, hearing Ashley crashing through the wet undergrowth behind her. The shock of what she had been told was still hovering, it was safest to feel anger and rage, but somewhere, in the back of her mind, a little voice was saying:
Your mother was a bad girl and your father isn’t your father at all! You’re a bastard, that’s what your father didn’t want to have to tell you – and your mother was a loose woman who didn’t love you one bit – she couldn’t have loved you or she’d never have killed herself Why, she must have hated you – she died rather than stay with you!

‘Tess? Stop, will you – you’ll hurt yourself! Look, it’s not such a . . . Oh, my God!’

She had half turned to see how close he was and must, she realised afterwards, have run slap-bang into a tree. She reeled back, then felt the ground come up and crush dead leaves, undergrowth, wet grass, against her unresisting face. She screamed, then a heavy weight landed in the middle of her back and someone’s arms went round her in a tight hug.

‘My God, Tess, have I hurt you? I was so close behind that I couldn’t stop myself . . . Oh my darling,
how
I love you! Please, please love me a little!’

The fall had knocked all the breath out of her and addled her wits; she could not remember what she had been doing, who this person was. She said unsteadily, ‘What’s happened? Where am I?’ and then the speaker began to kiss her. Soft kisses trembled across the nape of her neck, moved round to the side of her face, across her chin . . . up to her unresisting mouth.

She had never been kissed before; her father’s kisses were not like this! And the hands which turned her to face him were gentle, careful of her. Suddenly all the misery and horror of the last twenty minutes resurfaced and she remembered everything – the visit to the graveyard, Ashley’s words, her subsequent flight. She gave a small sob, but the kissing continued, and the gentle handling, and she was past flight, past fight, too. She sighed and looked into the face so near her own, at the tangle of hair beaded with raindrops and the wet, tanned skin. She would have to face up to what he had told her, and now seemed like a good time to start.

‘Ash? I hated you. I didn’t know, you see. No one told me . . . just that she was dead, not that she . . .’

‘It’s probably just a story they tell in the village,’ Ashley said. He had been lying half on top of her, now he removed his weight from her and rolled her into his arms, cuddling her wet, oilskinned figure against his chest. ‘I’ve always been a stupid, insensitive pig but believe me, I’d never have said a word if I’d known – if I’d known you were Leonora’s daughter. And your father . . . I know what I said, but it was just my stupidness . . . your father stood by her and was a real brick. I hope I’ll meet him one day.’

‘He’s not my father,’ Tess said steadily. ‘He’s a wonderful person, and he’s been better than any real father could have been, but . . . he can’t be my father. You said the man who was my father d-d-died.’

She was shaking now, with cold and shock, her voice trembling with it.

‘Does it matter?’ Ashley put his cold, wet face against hers and made a sweet, purring sound. ‘Mr Delamere must have adopted you, I suppose. If he isn’t your real father, of course. But I’ve never heard anyone say who – who Leonora’s chap was, so it could have been your dad.’

‘I don’t know and I don’t suppose I ever shall,’ Tess said wearily. ‘I’ll have to think about things, but I can’t face it quite yet, and until I do, I’m going to put it right out of my mind and forget I know.’ She gently freed herself from Ashley’s arms and stood up, then gave a muffled sob. ‘Oh Ash, what do you suppose we looked like, the pair of us? Soaked to the skin, still in our oilies, and lashing around in the long grass, kissing and crying! What on earth will people think?’

‘Doesn’t matter because no one saw,’ Ashley said, getting to his feet as well. Tess saw that he was red in the face but that his eyes were peaceful. ‘I’ll forget it too, then. I wish I’d kept my big mouth shut, but . . . That reminds me, I never said what I came down to the churchyard to say, either. Me and a friend of mine, Keith, thought it might be fun to go to the flicks this afternoon – you and Freddy, me and him. The new Charlie Chaplin film’s showing at the Haymarket –
Modern Times
, it’s called. What d’you think?’

‘Can’t afford it,’ Tess said briefly. ‘Sorry.’

‘No, idiot, it’s our treat, Keith’s and mine.’

‘Oh. Well, we’ll ask Freddy, shall we?’

‘Right. I expect she’ll say “yes”, especially if she’s finished that wretched dress. And Tess – you’ve been a sport, honest. I promise you I won’t say anything about what happened here to anyone if you won’t. I’m really ashamed of myself. I behaved so badly . . .’

‘I won’t say a word,’ Tess said tiredly. ‘I just want to forget it for now. But later . . . oh, later I’m going to have a lot of sorting out to do.’

In bed that night, when the cinema trip and the fish and chip supper at Deacons were just memories, Tess fought to come to terms with what Ashley had told her. Oddly, her hatred of him, her disgust, had evaporated as though it had never been. It was not his fault that he had, unknowingly, told her the truth, and heaven knew he had said he was sorry in every way he knew how. She remembered that she hadn’t liked him much before he’d told her those dreadful things in the churchyard but now, after the kisses and the huggings, she realised that Ashley was quite a complex person and that the sneery way he behaved sometimes was some sort of defence. She had talked it over with Freddy before Freddy had fallen asleep, and Freddy had assured her that Ashley, though he could be sarcastic and tactless, even cruel, was also often generous and kind. Tess trusted Freddy’s judgement, but had no intention of getting too involved with Freddy’s brother. He knew too much.

She wondered what she should say to Peter, when he and Marianne and Cherie came home. Should she tell him she knew what had happened to her mother? But it wasn’t quite true; she knew that Peter had married Leonora and brought up Leonora’s child as his own, but she didn’t know who her real father was. She supposed it must be the boy who had been killed, but she didn’t know for sure. And had Leonora committed suicide, or was that just spiteful village gossip? Tess had lived in a small village for long enough to realise that it really did exist. People would believe what they wanted to believe and deny the truth if it pleased them to do so. So it was quite possible, then, that Leonora’s boat had come to pieces just as Peter had said. If only – oh, if
only
he hadn’t lied!

On thinking it over, she was shocked to find that her own illegitimacy mattered deeply to her. Now and then, when she least expected it, the words
I’m a bastard
would enter her mind and each time they did, she felt a stab of pain. And what Peter had said about her maternal grandparents’ attitude hurt, too. I was only a child but she wouldn’t see me, didn’t want to know me, Tess thought. It would have been awfully nice to have a granny, all lavender water and lace caps and those mittens with the fingers out, who would feed me with sugar almonds and tell me stories about when she was a girl. She might have told me about Leonora, too, made the whole thing easier to bear. But she couldn’t have been a very nice woman, to throw her daughter out like that and never have her back, not even after she married.

She understood now why she had seen so little of her paternal grandparents, too, in fact she found their attitude much easier to understand than that of Leonora’s parents. Why should they welcome a child who was no blood relative into their family? They had retired to a cottage in Ilfracombe, North Devon, when she had been quite small and though Peter wrote to them and they wrote back, it had not been suggested that visits might be exchanged. Indeed, I know Marianne’s family better than I know the Delameres, Tess realised with a slight pang. And I don’t like the Duprés one bit!

There was Uncle Phil, of course, and the cousins. She didn’t see much of them, but they exchanged visits from time to time. Auntie May was always very sweet to her and the cousins were friendly, though they were older than she, already working, living away from home.

But of course they aren’t my cousins, and Uncle Phil and Auntie May aren’t related to me either, Tess found herself thinking. A dreadful coldness began to seep into her mind. In one blow she had lost everything – identity, parents, relatives. And if her mother had killed herself, that was the worst pain of all, because it must mean, it had to mean, that she hadn’t loved the young Tess. Not even enough to bring me up, Tess mourned now. She must have loved Daddy, because he’s such a wonderful person, so it must have been having me that pushed her into doing what she did. Dear God, she must have hated having a daughter!

But balanced against that was Peter’s love, which had been strong enough to take on someone else’s baby. It was impossible to doubt the depth of his love, which was a warming thought. But other thoughts, cold ones, crowded in thick and fast. Marianne hates me. I tried to get her to like me but it never did work and she hates me. Cherie doesn’t care much one way or the other, she just likes a quiet life. And Andy hasn’t been back and we were good friends – I thought we were, anyway.

What about Janet, though? Janet was still very much her friend, and Mrs Thrower’s warmth and affection were always there. When Tess behaved badly Mrs Thrower mobbed her as she did her own kids, but forgiveness was always there at the end of the day, warm arms and a motherly hug would welcome her the next time she called round.

Am I bad or good? Tess asked herself, tossing and turning in her bed in the guest room at the Blofield house. Ashley likes me, he kissed and cuddled me beautifully – but suppose he likes me because he thinks I’m a loose woman, like my mother? Suppose he thinks I’ll ‘come across’ as they say in books? Alarmingly, it occurred to her that girls were not supposed to enjoy being kissed and cuddled by boys they scarcely knew. Was it a sign of loose morals to enjoy such things? Girls at school talked about kisses and more as though it was all wonderful, wicked, daring. But if my mother got into trouble then I should be especially careful not to do the same, Tess told herself. Oh, how I wish I’d never found that poor, strange little grave, all by itself in the long grass! I thought I wanted to know the truth – but the truth hurts like a knife twisting in an open wound so that I can hardly bear it.

At midnight she heard the grandfather clock strike twelve times, then she slept, waking at two a.m. when the life force is at a low ebb and unhappiness hovers behind one’s sleepless shoulder. She sat up and looked across the room at the lighter patch which was the window and thought:
I’m a different person. Like Pandora in the Greek legend I opened the box and all the troubles of the world flew out and buzzed around my ears. The carefree, inquisitive Tess of yesterday has gone for ever, and quite a different person has come in her place
.

Presently, she slept again, only to wake an hour later. This time the thought leapt straight into her mind:
How will I face Daddy
,
knowing what I do
? It wasn’t as if she could talk it over with a friend, tell Mrs Thrower, ask Freddy’s opinion. That would be cruelly unfair to her father, a real betrayal. He had moved from Blofield to Barton to try to keep clear of gossip and conjecture, she must be careful not to let him down, to give away a secret which was more his than hers.