The Bobbin Girls (27 page)

‘Then you’ve no absolute proof that she existed?’

‘I have Stella Bird’s word for it.’

‘But that’s all?’

They both saw the implications. If the rumours were true about the affair and a child had been the result, this was exactly the sort of fanciful yarn the housekeeper would need to tell, to divert suspicion away from herself and her lover. ‘I’d no reason not to believe her. I’m not one to give credence to gossip-mongers and, as I said, James Hollinthwaite is a cold fish with a high opinion of himself.’

‘What about Olivia? Do you think she might know anything?’

‘Nay. James’d make sure of that.’

‘Oh, Ma. Do
you
think it’s true? If we can’t find out one way or the other then what of Rob and me?’ She’d finally managed to say his name.

Lizzie stroked back a damp curl and met her daughter’s pleading gaze without flinching. ‘I don’t know what to think, to be honest. But happen you’d best not see him again, lass. Just to be on the safe side. Not till we know for sure, anyroad.’

Chapter Fourteen

Olivia was frantic. Once more her darling son was leaving and no one would tell her why. Rob was clearly suffering from some terrible agony that he would speak of to no one, not even to his mother. Particularly his mother. She begged and pleaded with him not to go, but he packed a single bag, kissed her tenderly and told her he would write when he’d got settled. Then he walked out of the house and, for all she knew, out of her life.

She turned instead to her husband, but he was no more forthcoming. James had had a long talk with the boy, man to man, spelling out a few facts about life and marriage, and they’d had something of a disagreement. But it was a private matter between father and son, he told her, and really nothing for her to worry over. The boy would come round, given time to get over his sulks.

In fact he’d finally made a suggestion for Rob’s future which had proved acceptable. It had been a climb-down in a way, but perhaps would be for the best in the long run, the way things were shaping up. James certainly had no intention at this juncture of divulging any further details to his wife, for she would only start asking too many questions. He’d always taken the view that the less Olivia knew the better. He certainly had no wish to risk any exchange of views between herself and the Townsen girl, or the whole silly business could blow up again, despite the pains he’d taken to drive them apart. So he patronisingly suggested she take a short holiday. ‘Italy perhaps, or France. You like France dear, being so well versed in the language. Shall I buy you a ticket?’

‘No!’ she screamed, beside herself with misery. ‘I couldn’t take a holiday when my son, my own darling boy, has walked out and gone I know not where.’

‘Don’t start on your hysterics, Olivia, the boy said he’d write.

‘Letters? What good are a few letters? I need him
here
, where I can see him, touch him, talk to him. Why do you always drive the boy away? You must find him for me, James. Apologise for your silly quarrel, whatever it was. Make him come home!’ Anxious to appease her, James patted her shoulder and promised that he would do everything he could, while having no intention of doing any such thing.

For a week Olivia languished, weeping and railing by turn, all her carefully nurtured forbearance finally crumbling away. Love. Was that too much to ask? For years she had endured the stultifying confines of a loveless marriage. She’d done her duty by James, hadn’t asked for passion or excitement, only warmth and kindness, a feeling that she was cared for. She’d tolerated her husband’s coldness because of Rob, and perhaps for the sake of propriety. Now, if she was to be denied these essentials even from her beloved son, who had been driven from the house, her life seemed pointless.

One morning she woke perfectly calm, as if a storm had passed. She dressed in sensible warm clothing, packed a bag of essentials and, without asking James’s permission, drove his new motor up the drive, along the lanes and headed in the direction of Grizedale. She drove at a reckless rate, uncaring of what or whom she might encounter on the way, the wind whipping her hair into disarray. When the road ended she abandoned the Morris and walked, nearly ran, the rest of the way to that secret place in the woods she knew so well.

Here, Olivia found her lover, rested her cheek against the hard expanse of his chest, stroked his beloved weathered face and cried. ‘Find my boy for me. Frank. Find him!’

But they did not find him. Frank Roscoe because he did not know where to look. James because for all he could easily guess, he had no intention even of trying. And neither of them, for their different reasons, greatly minded that he was lost, or wished him to be found.

By the time Alena sought out Olivia at Ellersgarth Hall, Mrs Hollinthwaite had, according to a dour-faced Mrs Milburn, ‘Packed her bags and done a moonlight flit. Run off God knows where, with lord knows who. Seems to be a fashion in this house.’

There was only one person who could answer her many questions, and that was James Hollinthwaite himself. Alena didn’t think he’d be likely to oblige. Even so, she meant to ask. Every day she called at the house, varying the time in her determination to gain admittance, but was always denied entry. James insisted that he had no wish to see or to speak to her. In the end Mrs Milburn convinced her to stop trying.

‘He’s that cut up about the missus leaving, I reckon the poor man’ll run mad if you pester him too much. Leave him be, lass. He paces the rooms of this empty house night after night. You wouldn’t believe he’d feel her going so keenly, and the boy too. What a pandemonium!’

Alena was of the more sceptical opinion that James Hollinthwaite grieved the loss of his family as he might his sporting gun or his favourite cherry-wood walking stick rather than for their own sake, but she ceased to call on the embattled housekeeper. Then one Sunday she met him coming out of church, and bravely followed him along the lane until he was forced to turn and face her.

She felt nothing but loathing for this man. Never had she experienced such hatred for another human being. For all the difficulties she’d had with her father (she still thought of Ray as such), and for all his casual brutality, it paled into insignificance besides this more calculated evil.

‘I will not have you hounding me, Alena Townsen. Pray desist.’

‘I want the truth.’

‘You have the truth. Would it make you feel better if I were to repeat it?’

‘I’d be more likely to believe you were it not for the fact I know how determined you are to separate us.’

He stood watching her, saying nothing. Alena experienced a strong desire to fight him, to shout her denial, to run and find Rob and make him come back to her no matter what the cost. Her emotions swung from hope to fear and back to hope again. But what if she were wrong? What if it were not a lie? Could she afford to ignore this worm of a doubt and perhaps suffer terrible consequences?

‘It was a lie, wasn’t it? Ma has told me all about the girl who arrived at your door that night. Why won’t you admit it?’

Again that unnerving smile and Alena felt heat rise up her neck and flood her cheeks. But she really mustn’t lose her temper. No good would come of that. Nor would she let him see how she feared his answer. Chin up, face set, every line of her graceful body showed a raw and desperate dignity. ‘Where is he?’

‘Where you won’t find him.’

‘You’ll not keep us apart. He’ll never stop loving me, nor I him. You can’t ever take that away from us.’

Callously, cruelly, he laughed, then just as quickly the sound died, his face closing in like the weather darkening the tops of the Furness Fells, and where formerly had been sunshine and the happy song of the thrush in the peaceful quiet of the lane, now there seemed to be only silence and a deep, shivering cold despite the fact that the sun still shone warm on her back.

‘Much good may it do you both. Love cannot be deposited in a bank. It won’t build a man a house or make his fortune. In fact, it has no value. Whether you believe me or not is really quite irrelevant. Rob does. And because of that belief, my son may have your love, if he feels so inclined, but he can’t have
you
. Ever!’

She saw then the extent of his victory. Her views on the subject were really of no account. Rob believed what his father told him. And Rob had gone.

James had little time during the next twelve months to worry too much about his disobedient son or straying wife. Not for a moment did he doubt that his actions had been justified, so why should he concern himself? It didn’t even trouble him that there were rumblings of war in distant Germany. If war ever came, and hopefully it wouldn’t, he’d make sure he was on the winning side and make money out of it. He’d got a good price for the larch he’d already sold. And he had more to offer, which the Navy would undoubtedly need.

The bobbin mill might do well, but who knew what the future might hold? James Hollinthwaite did not believe in keeping all his eggs in one basket.

He noted with interest the public outcry over the purchase by - the Forestry Commission of 7,000 acres of land in Eskdale, the Duddon Valley and Ennerdale. He studied the reports and letters in the press, pumped his friend George Tyson for every scrap of information he could muster, listened to news of questions in the House, of petitions and arguments from people in every walk of life from the lowest to the highest in the land. Keenly, he mapped every detail of the campaign.

Eskdale, a magnificent curving fellside of broken crag and bracken, possessed without doubt a noble loveliness which made it one of the finest of the Lake District valleys. Duddon Valley, which ran from the stepping stones below Grass Gars to the head of Mosedale and as far as Wrynose, was uniquely remote and unspoiled with breathtaking views of Scafell. The fells of Ennerdale were surrounded by some of the finest peaks of Lakeland: Pillar, Windy Gap, Great Gable, Haystacks and Steeple to name but a few. These, then, were the areas under threat.

The Council for the Preservation of Rural England and the Friends of the Lake District were the ones fighting the plans. holding conferences and meetings, negotiating, making demands. The Commission reminded them that afforestation actually began back in 1919 when Whinlatter, a pan of Thornthwaite Forest near Keswick, missed by a single day the distinction of being the first planting of larch by the Forestry Commission. Eggesford in Devon held that record. Even then they were only following a fashion begun by private landowners: the Curwens of Belle Isle: the Spedding family of Mire House. Even the Brocklebanks of Liverpool had planted larch, calling them ‘exotics’, in the grounds of their famous mansions. Later they’d turned to commercial production for the lead and copper mines of Derwent Water and Coniston.

It was this last argument which was of most interest to James. He believed in following in the steps of fine families and the traditions of their noble houses. Except that he, not being constrained by their more conservative principles and tender hearts, could do even better. Sitka spruce was a better tree to plant than larch, his research informed him. It was fast-growing and well suited to a damp climate. Not for a moment did he doubt that the Commission would win, or that his own plans, when he put them into operation, would be equally successful.

Life was hard for Rob in the upper reaches of Grizedale. He’d spent months working on these heights, planting in all weathers, sometimes in conditions so bad he could barely stand against the lashing wind and rain.

But he was thankful for this job with the Forestry Commission, better paid than his previous one with the private landowner his father had put him on to. The Commission had recently bought the estate of Grizedale intact, 2,500 hectares, including the Hall and cottages, from Harold Brocklebank, part owner of the Cunard Line. The moment Rob had heard, he’d come looking for work and found it.

He worked now in a gang of about a dozen men, planting the young trees in neat rows marked out by stakes and string. He didn’t much care for all the square comers and straight lines, but it was so they would know where to find them come summer when the rows had to be weeded out. Weeds could all too quickly choke a young tree to death. Sometimes he felt as if he too were choking

How he missed Alena still, after all this time. To lose her so soon after discovering the new
^-
depth of the love between them was bad enough; if he allowed himself to contemplate the reason for this loss, it tore him in two. The prospect that he loved and desired his own sister filled him with horror.

Yet it must be true. James had spoken of a cold marriage, of his needing the comforts that Stella Bird, and a number of other women in those early years, had offered. Listening to him attempt to justify his actions, Rob had glimpsed an aspect of his parents life he’d no wish to see. He could still recall the despair of that day, the way his mind had shut down and refused to function. Yet in the inevitable arguments that had followed, for once his father had been sympathetic, and listened to Rob’s ambitions When he’d announced his decision to go and look for work in the forests, James had provided names of prospective employers, agreeing that university could always wait until later.

Now, in the autumn of 1936, Rob felt that he no longer had a home, certainly not one he could return to. Though in many ways he’d not regretted the decision to leave Ellersgarth, he still deeply regretted the loss of Alena. He needed her, he loved her. It was as simple, and as terrifying, as that.