The Flood-Tide (2 page)

‘Mother! It's not fair!' A familiar, strident voice upraised in fierce complaint preceded Jemima's ten-year-old daughter Charlotte into the kitchen. Charlotte was big for her age, with long, strong bones, a glow of health in her freckled face, and curly hair that defied discipline. She had all the restless energy of a colt, and a head that seethed with plans, usually for forbidden activities. She was quick-tempered, clever, untidy, and passionately devoted to her twin, who held the other side of the loaded basket she was bringing in.

Poor little William presented a very different aspect. Jemima often thought that Charlotte must have absorbed all the strength when they were together in the womb, for William was small, pale, thin, and meek-tempered. Jemima was agreeably surprised to have kept him to the age of ten for he was frail, troubled with coughs and headaches, and likely to take any illness that was around. The smallest knock bruised his delicate skin; if cut, he bled frighteningly; his digestion was uncertain. And yet he adored Charlotte, and followed her like her shadow, climbing trees to fall out of them, swimming in rivers to catch cold of them, eating wild sloes and crab apples because she recommended them, having herself a digestion that could have thrived on horseshoe nails. He got himself cut and gashed and bitten and stung in her wake, and wept far more when she was punished for leading him into danger than he ever did for his own pains.

‘My dear Charlotte,' Jemima said with amused exasperation, 'you look as though you had been doing battle.' Charlotte's dusty face was drawn into a frown, her head was like a gorse bush, her mouth, hands, clothes and even her hair were stained with plum juice.

‘It isn't fair. William and I are doing
everything,
and the others aren't helping at all. James has hardly carried three pounds, and now he's swimming in the moat and won't do any more, and you never let me swim in the moat.'

‘He's only six, dearest, and he's probably tired. He has worked hard for a little one,' Jemima said, avoiding the more delicate question of swimming. It did seem hard to her that a girl should not be allowed to do some of the more pleasant things that boys did, but it was the way of the world. 'And surely Edward is helping.' Edward, her oldest son, aged eleven, was immensely conscientious.

‘Well, he
was,'
Charlotte said, reluctant to concede any point. ‘But now that silly Anstey boy has come, and he says he is his guest and he has to take care of him.' John Anstey was the son of a neighbouring merchant, and Edward's best friend, and they were to go to school together next year, something to which Edward looked forward with great excitement, since he had always been educated at home before by Father Ramsay. 'And all John Anstey wants to do is moon over Mary. Imagine, over Mary!' Charlotte's voice took on a tone of horror. Mary, a year younger than Charlotte, was in every way different from her, and had an almost squeamish horror of dirtying her clothes or hands. 'Mary isn't any use at anything. She can't ride properly, or climb a tree, and all she's done all day is sit on a seat in the orchard primping and primming, and then the Anstey boy comes and takes her basket from her and sa
^y
s she shouldn't be getting herself hot and dirty. It's awful.’

Jemima couldn't help laughing at Charlotte's outrage, but as her frown grew ferocious, she added hastily, 'Mary's ways are very different from yours, my love.'

‘But you let her off tasks that you make me do, Mama, and never rate her as you do me. It isn't fair!’

The eternal cry of childhood, Jemima thought, though in her own childhood it could never be uttered aloud. There were many in the household who thought she allowed Charlotte to speak too freely to her, but she had been so oppressed and miserable herself at Charlotte's age that she could not be so strict with her.

‘You and Mary are made of different clay, my love,' she said mildly. 'It will not serve to try to make the same vessel of you both. We shall all stop in a little while for some dinner, in any case. Would you like to help carry it out to the orchard?’

Charlotte allowed herself to be pacified. 'May I ring the bell, too, Mama!'

‘Yes, if you like. William, you're looking pale. Do you have the headache?' She stretched her hand out for him, and he came to her side and leaned briefly against her.

Not really,' he said. Not very much.’

Jemima ruffled his pale hair and laid the back of her hand against his hot forehead. 'No more picking for you after dinner. Poor little William. I wish you had some of Charlotte's strength.’

Because her hand was in the way, and perhaps also because her mind was on other things, she missed the expression of anguish that crossed her son's face.

*

It was not an elegant feast, such as her mother might have consented to preside over; and certainly Lady Mary would never have so far forgot her dignity as to sit on the grass in the orchard, even had her silken clothes and rigid hoops and stays allowed it. Jemima had been one of the first ladies in the neighbourhood to adopt the new calico and cotton fabrics for common wear, and in the summer especially they were a boon, not only being cooler and allowing more freedom of movement, but being infinitely easier to wash than woollen. In the country, except on formal occasions, Jemima wore no hoops and only the mildest of stiffening, and she was able to settle herself in the place of honour on the grass before the spread cloth, under the old medlar tree.

Father Ramsay came through the trees to join her, looking cheerful and relaxed after his morning's picking.

‘It is a good thing to change one's labour from time to time,' he said, rolling down his sleeves. He had bits of broken twig in his hair, and smuts on his face, and his breeches were tied at the knee with string. Jemima smiled at him affectionately. 'It makes one appreciate the advantages of one's normal pursuits. I have enjoyed the fresh air and sunshine, but my hands!' He turned them over and back and shook his head sadly.

‘Come and sit down, Father. Here, you shall have this bucket for a seat,' Jemima offered. 'I must make you comfortable, or you will leave me for an easier position. When I think of all the tasks I force you to undertake, I tremble. How should I ever manage wtihout you?’

Father Ramsay upended the bucket, examined it, and lowered himself, grimacing, onto it. 'My dear Jemima, if I had thought the post of chaplain here meant only saying Mass and tutoring the boys, I should not have taken it. What is in the jug?'

‘Buttermilk. Will you have some?’

Father Ramsay smiled his sphingine smile. 'You know my opinion of buttermilk,' he said. 'I'll wait for the ale.’

Charlotte and William brought it a few moments later, in two large jugs, and from the other direction Edward and his friend John Anstey joined them, escorting Mary, who managed to make it seem that the picnic spread under the trees had been arranged entirely for her benefit. At nine years old there was already nothing left of the child in Mary, and looking at the perfect little woman, Jemima could not remember that she ever had been a child. She was very pretty, with perfectly regular features, even teeth, black curling hair and blue eyes with dark lashes; she wore her clothes with an air, was neat and particular, and had a great conceit of herself. Jemima regarded her with something like wonder, that she could have borne a creature so unlike herself. It was Nature taking her revenge, she thought sometimes: Mary was a daughter such as Lady Mary would have liked Jemima to be.

‘Ah, there you are, boys. Sit down. Come, Mary, it's only a dead leaf. Don't make such a fuss, child. Father Ramsay, will you cut the pie?' Her family gathered round and helped themselves from the laden cloth. Though not elegant, the food was ample and good: one of Abram's pork-and-liver pies, if not quite the size of a cartwheel, at least the size of a cartwheel hat; and venison pasties, and the morning's bake of bread with slices of brawn and cheese and cold beef; and sticky brown bricks of gingerbread, and, since plums would have been almost an insult, baked apples, the first of the year's harvest. ‘Now, do you all have what you like? But where is Flora?'

‘Here I am, Cousin Jemima - and my little Jamesie,' Flora said, coming from the direction of the kitchen garden. James was looking pale and thoughtful, besides grubby about the mouth.

‘Oh dear, what has he been doing now?' Jemima said, gathering her youngest son to her side. He had lost all his infant chubbiness and was growing wiry, though he was small for his age. He would be like his father, she thought, small and compact; like him in character, too, from what she remembered of Allen in his young days: reserved and curiously self-sufficient. James could happily spend a whole morning alone playing with two twigs and a beetle, utterly absorbed in some inner world of his own.

‘He was eating radishes,' Flora said.

‘Oh dear. How many?' Jemima asked.

‘There were an awful lot missing from the row. I think they're mostly up now though,' Flora said delicately.

‘Oh dear. Well, come and sit down, Flora, and have some dinner,' Jemima said apologetically. James settled unconcernedly under her flank and reached for a venison pasty, and Flora, declining the offer of the bucket from Father Ramsay, took her other side. She was the daughter of Jemima's youngest uncle, Charles, the botanist who in the intervals of his ‘herborizing' expeditions abroad had married the daughter of a Glasgow shipowner. There had been four children: young Charles, who was following in his father's footsteps and already making a name for himself, Louisa, who had died young, Angus, and Flora. Aunt Mary had died when Angus and Flora were very young, and since Uncle Charles was so much abroad, Jemima had offered the two youngest children a home at Morland Place. Angus, who was seventeen, was at university in Edinburgh. Flora was sixteen, and ravishingly pretty, and now that Uncle Charles was also dead, having succumbed to the bite of some lethal insect in the South American jungle, she regarded Morland Place as her permanent home. She had been a great help and comfort to Jemima, and in the past few years had provided her with a much-needed female companion. The life of the mistress of Morland Place was often a lonely one.

‘Baked apples! How lovely,' Flora said as she surveyed the feast. ‘I'm glad it's not plums. I don't feel as if I should ever be able to look at one again.’

Jemima laughed. ‘And to think only a fortnight ago we were so delighted with the first pies and junkets.'

‘It is rather all or nothing with plums,' Father Ramsay said. ‘Flora, will you take ale or buttermilk?'

‘It's a pity the cider isn't ready yet,' Jemima said, ‘but it will be another week at least.'

‘We must be sure to put a cask aside for Cousin Thomas to take back with him,' Flora said eagerly. Jemima smiled inwardly. It the past few weeks Flora had managed to bring his name into a surprising number of conversations. ‘It is quite dreadful to think of him drinking green water, thick with living things. The privations our sailors endure are enough to break one's heart.'

‘I dare say Thomas manages to get something else to drink from time to time,' Father Ramsay said drily. ‘And as to privations - remember last time he was home on leave, he was but a lieutenant. I imagine the hardships of even a junior captain are far less. But doubtless he will know how to value your concern for him, Flora.’

Flora blushed painfully, and Jemima came to her rescue.

‘We are all very proud of him, to be made "post" at such a young age. He is evidently well thought of at the Admiralty.'

‘He evidently has friends in high places,' Father Ramsay amended. Tor almost the most junior captain on the List to be given command of a new-built ship, not even out of dry dock yet, argues something more effective than virtue. He is rising more swiftly even than his father.’

Thomas's father, Jemima's Uncle Thomas, had had a spectacular career in the navy, rising to be the youngest Rear Admiral in the fleet, before yellow fever carried him off on the West India station. Since Thomas's mother was also dead, he, like Flora, now regarded Morland Place as his home. Seeing Flora about to defend her cousin, Jemima interposed again.

‘It is wonderful that he is to have such a long leave with us this time. Though I daresay sailors and sailors' families are always at odds about the desirability of time spent on shore. If the winds serve he should be here by next week. I dare say he will write from Portsmouth to tell us when he arrives. He will have things to do there before he comes north.'

‘Sailors can always find things to do in Portsmouth,' Father Ramsay said. 'Perhaps he may never come north at all.'

‘Of course he will,' Jemima said hastily. ‘The old
Hydra
is to be broken up, and his new ship is not finished yet, so he will have plenty of time to spend with us. Father, have one of the pasties. They are excellent.’

Jemima's dinner was interrupted by one of the grooms from Twelvetrees, where the stud horses were kept.

‘Mester 'Umby says 'at one of th' visitin' mares is lookin' proper dowly, mistress, an' could you come?' he chanted breathlessly, rosy with embarrassment at having to speak before the entire assembled family. Jemima sighed inwardly, but Humby, the head man, could be relied upon not to send for her on a trifle.

‘Which mare is it?' she asked.

‘Her that come in from Wetherby this mornin',' the boy said, and grew more confident. ‘Mester 'Umby were right put-about, and sent her straight to the isolation box. She's proper poorly lookin'. Mester 'Umby says—'