скачать книгу бесплатно
‘I’m not sacking you, lad; my argument’s not with you.’
‘But with Alice?’ Victor countered shortly. ‘What’s she ever done to hurt you?’
‘Nothing,’ Mr Dedlington snapped, rubbing his forehead with his stubby hands. ‘The world’s not fair, lad. Things don’t work out the way we want.’ His voice dropped. ‘They’ve got me over a barrel, Victor. If you don’t break it off with Alice, you can look for work elsewhere.’
Victor stared at Mr Dedlington and saw him colour. He had thought it was such a kindness for his employer to help him, to find them the house to rent on Trafalgar Street. Mr Dedlington had loaned him money – a debt which had yet to be repaid – but having supported the couple so willingly it was a bitter blow that he was now turning on them.
‘I can’t give her up.’ Sickened, Victor heard his voice harden.
‘Then you lose your job,’ Mr Dedlington replied, ‘and you owe me money, Victor. Don’t forget that. A debt’s a debt.’
‘I’ll pay it back!’
‘If you leave, I want the money on the day you leave.’
Victor stared at him, stupefied. ‘You know I can’t do that! I don’t have any money.’
‘So keep your job.’
It was blackmail, Victor realised. Neither he nor Alice had really escaped Netherlands. Clare Lees was still pulling the strings, still determined to get even with the protégée who had betrayed her.
‘I can’t give Alice up,’ Victor repeated. ‘What would happen to her without me? I love her, I can’t abandon her.’
‘She could get a job, she’d cope. Other woman do it all the time,’ Mr Dedlington said sharply. He was in the wrong, and knew it. His guilt made him defensive. ‘There are enough jobs going in this town. She’ll not starve.’
‘What possible good would it do you for me to break up with her?’
The older man stared Victor in the face. ‘I’ve told you. I’ve a business to run. I’m not your father; I don’t have to mollycoddle you, or your girl. Life’s hard, Victor –’
Furiously, Victor threw down his plane and snatched up his coat. At the door he turned and looked back to his employer.
‘I know life’s hard! It always has been for me – and for Alice. Nothing came easy to either of us, but I would never have let down someone in trouble.’
Mr Dedlington was stung by the remark and turned away from the accusing look in Victor’s eyes.
‘You either report for work tomorrow and tell me that it’s over, or you don’t come back at all. And you’ve a debt outstanding, don’t forget that. The choice is yours. But remember, Victor, there are many lads who would like your job. That girl’s trouble. She came from trouble and she’s already caused you plenty. Think on that you’re not taking on too much to handle.’
Twenty minutes later Victor let himself into the house in Trafalgar Street. The cool damp air hit him as he entered and, looking round, he saw for the first time how really gloomy the place was. He hadn’t noticed when they first came; had been too caught up in the excitement. But now he saw it as others did – as Alice must.
He missed her with sudden, hard longing. Life without Alice, without coming to see her, without dreaming of their future together – that wouldn’t be a life. He would starve, die for her, die with her. But leave her? Never.
Calling out for Alice, Victor walked into the kitchen. The room was tidy. Lately she had spruced up the tired little house, bringing in flowers and lighting a small fire in the grate. She had even propped up some cheap postcards on the mantel, trying to make it look as though it was their home, as though they had had a history together.
His heart shifting, Victor then noticed a plate, covered by a cloth, laid out for him. Beside it was a note.
Dearest Victor,
I have gone out for a while, but will be back soon. Your supper’s ready for you.
Loving you, always, always, always,
Your Alice
Touched, he lifted the cloth. She had made him sandwiches, cut into delicate shapes, a bar of cheap toffee lying next to them. His favourite. The sight moved him so much that he sat down, staring at her note. He couldn’t live without her, he wouldn’t live without her. They would survive. He would find another job, it would work out.
The sound of the door opening brought him back to his senses. Walking in, Alice smiled at him.
‘Hello, love. Have you just got in?’
How could he live without hearing that voice, seeing those eyes? It was absurd. Let her out of his life? She was his life.
‘Just now.’
She touched his cheek. ‘You look worried, what is it?’
‘Nothing.’
But she knew him too well to be fooled. Two orphan children, they had bonded to each other so completely that their thoughts and emotions were read as easily by each other as someone else would read a newspaper.
‘Come on, Victor, tell me.’
He settled her on his lap. ‘There’s a problem at work …’
‘No!’ she said anxiously. ‘You love it there.’
‘It’s nothing I can’t handle.’
She wasn’t fooled; felt the lie. ‘Victor, what is it?’
‘Nothing. Honestly nothing.’
‘What is it?’ she repeated.
‘Mr Dedlington’s been … He’s seen Clare Lees.’ Alice’s eyes fixed on Victor anxiously. ‘She came to see him – and said that it would be better for his business if we broke up.’
Alice said nothing. She had hoped to come home and be able to talk about what she had discovered. About the fact that she had a sibling. She had wanted to tell Victor that it was all true. She had come from a fortune, from a great family – just as she had always imagined. She had wanted to tell him that Judge Arnold had seen his granddaughter put away. In fact, she had wanted to cry about it and let Victor tell her that it was all right, because they had each other. She wanted to know that she wasn’t alone.
But now she looked at Victor and realised that his life and career were about to penalised because of her. He would lose his job if he stayed with her, and all the future prosperity he looked forward to. His talent would be wasted. And why? Because he loved her. Victor Coates, honest, hard-working Victor loved Alice Rimmer, the offspring of a murderer. The carrier of bad blood.
It was not going to end, or be forgotten, Alice realised. She had suspected as much when she first heard the truth from Evan Thomas’s lips. Indeed, her first instinct had been to run out of Victor’s life, but he had stopped her. And now what had happened? His job was at stake because of her. And how many other jobs, other opportunities, would be lost because of her? Would Victor spend his life forever held back by the woman he loved?
And would any love last under such pressure? Alice felt her eyes fill but bit her lip hard to stop herself crying.
‘I’m not going to leave you,’ Victor said firmly. ‘I would never do that.’
‘You need your job. You’ve been Mr Dedlington’s apprentice for years. You’re going to finish your apprenticeship before long, Victor – be able to make some real money. If you lose that, what else is there for you? A job in the mill? Gasworks?’ She shook her head. ‘No, you deserve that job. It was the first good thing that happened to you.’
‘And you were the second,’ he replied, lifting her hand and kissing the tip of each finger. ‘How could I give you up, Alice? How could I work and sleep and think without you?’ His grip tightened on her hand. ‘You and I are a pair. We only have each other.’
‘It’s because of who I am,’ Alice said quietly, her voice dull. ‘Mr Dedlington’s old enough to remember what happened nearly twenty years ago – how many others are?’
‘It’s old news. People forget. No one else knows –’
‘Clare Lees and Evan Thomas know,’ she replied evenly, then dropped her head. ‘I’m not lucky for you, Victor. Nothing’s gone right since you met me.’
Helplessly he buried his face in her neck. ‘Don’t say that! You’re everything to me, Alice. We only have each other. I don’t care about the job, it’s not important. I just want you.’
Tenderly she kissed the top of his head, her eyes wandering to the corner of the room and resting on an old table. It was rickety, badly made, crude. Victor would never make anything like that, she thought. He created beautiful things, objects which rich people would buy. His hands could earn him money, raise him in the world. She could only hold him back.
Her gaze stayed on the chair, her heart closing down. She could see the images in the old newspaper clippings – her mother, her father, Judge Arnold. She could have been someone – not an orphan, patronised into submission. But it was worse than that: she wasn’t just a foundling, she was damned, marked out by her father’s actions. And how much of him was in her? She knew how excitable, how fired up she could get; knew how anger burned inside her, how she raged inwardly. It had even frightened her sometimes. When she was growing up she had thought that others must feel the same, but they didn’t. Ethel and Gilbert didn’t. Victor didn’t. Only she.
And why was that? Because she was like her father? She didn’t know, but she was afraid that she might be. Did she really want Victor to suffer for her? To lose out? Worse, did she ever want to look at him and see that he had become wary of her? Or, God forbid, frightened? And even if that never happened, would he grow to resent her for hindering him? No, Alice thought desperately, no, Victor. I love you too much to risk that.
Infinitely gentle, she nuzzled his hair and drank in the scent of him. She committed it to memory, so that she would never forget it. Love was not going to save her; it was not going to be that simple. Her life was not going to follow a calm route. At Netherlands, they had been separated by iron railings. Outside, in the real world, it was the iron will of one woman who was separating them again.
Clare Lees. Alice shuddered, her chest hollow, empty. Silent, Victor held on to her, their bodies fitting together so perfectly, so tenderly, as they had always done. Clare Lees. And Judge Arnold. Clare Lees, Judge Arnold … Alice repeated the names in her head and stared blankly at the chair in the corner whilst deciding on the course of action which would change her life for ever.
Chapter Eighteen (#ulink_37eacd82-3e5e-5b38-8bd2-88364c941fa1)
The weather abroad had proved too hot for Alwyn so the family had returned to The Dower House, Werneth Heights, earlier than usual. Leonard was delighted, throwing his son into the air and greeting his mother-in-law politely.
‘You look well.’
‘I’m in a wheelchair!’ Alwyn snapped back. ‘No one looks well in a wheelchair.’
Turning away from Leonard, she beckoned for her husband to come over. He did so at once, bowing mockingly to her, Alwyn’s smile making a woman out of her, instead of some handicapped martinet.
‘Miss me, Judge?’
He pinched her cheek and then pushed her chair over to the window. The garden was cool, coming into its winter mood, the bushes darkly sombre.
‘I thought of putting a Christmas tree in the middle of the lawn.’
‘It’s only October,’ Alwyn replied, but she was glad that her husband was trying to please her.
God knew how long it would last. Soon he would get bored with her, and turn to the grandchildren for amusement. She would then long for the balmy foreign nights away from the Northern cold. She would grow bored and homesick – and then settle again, after November had passed.
Thoughtfully Alwyn watched as her husband moved away and picked Robin up. He could take anything in his stride, she thought. He had had to. People admired a man who was tough, a man who didn’t crumble under pressure. Not like some. Any other man would have folded, but not him. He had kept the family together. And he always would.
Suddenly aware of her scrutiny, Judge Arnold turned round to his wife. He had to admit that she was a strong woman – he liked that about her – but she was deep. Oh yes, she was deep all right. Not one to show her feelings, not one to let you know what she was thinking. But affectionate. In the right place and at the right time. He couldn’t have done with some clinging, whining woman hanging on his arm. Mind you, no one like that could have coped with what had happened to their family.
It was a shame that she had had that stroke, but the doctors had been baffled by her incomplete recovery. She should have been back to normal long ago, they said, certainly out of the wheelchair. But Judge knew that the chair was his wife’s support. She had mentally withstood a tremendous amount, but something had to take the strain. With Alwyn, it was never going to be her brain, but her legs.
‘Why did you come back early, Alwyn? What was the real reason?’
‘It was hot.’
‘You’re a lizard; it has nothing to do with the heat.’
She glanced up at him coolly with her deep blue eyes. ‘I missed the shops.’
‘They have shops in France,’ he said calmly.
He never begrudged her spending. After all, they had money enough to buy anything Alwyn fancied. Besides, he was a generous man, when all was said and done. Liked his family to have the best. It looked good to his competitors, showed them that the business was doing well.
‘What brought you back?’ he asked again.
This time, she answered him honestly. ‘I want to talk to you about Dorothy –’
He cut her off. ‘No!’
Breathing in deeply, Alwyn stared at her husband. She saw a man with heavy brows and a deeply lined face topped by a shock of wiry hair, now greying. She saw hardness in his face and resilience – the things she admired. But not now. Now she was worried about their daughter and she wanted to talk to him about it. It would do him no good to pretend that everything was all right. Dorothy was restless again.
‘We have to talk –’
‘I said no!’
‘Oh, save that tone for your workforce!’ Alwyn snapped back. ‘You can’t intimidate me.’ Her hands smoothed her hair as though she was soothing her own temper. ‘Dorothy is upset. She’s been distant, uncommunicative. I wanted her home for November.’
Judge Arnold flinched.
‘You know what it means,’ Alwyn replied calmly. ‘Memories don’t fade for some people. I thought she was over it, but now I’m not so sure. Oh, come on, we have to talk about it.’
But Judge Arnold had snatched up his paper and was pretending to read. His daughter was skittish … Jesus, just what he feared. But then Dorothy was always was a bit preoccupied when the year wound round to 12 November … His attention moved to the window. Bloody awful weather, he thought, seeing the rain outside. Unwelcomed, his thoughts slid back relentlessly to the past.
It had been raining that night too … His eyes closed against the memory, but it came anyway. David Lewes, his son-in-law. So good-looking it hurt your eyes, he used to joke. Came from a fine family in Huddersfield, a good match everyone agreed. His daughter fell in love with David almost as soon as she saw him. And he returned the compliment. Who would have worried to have David Lewes courting their daughter? He was attentive, kind, always loving. They had married one year after they met and ten months later they had Charlie. Two years after that … Judge Arnold closed his mind to the thought of the second child.
He could sense his wife’s unease, next to him, but didn’t open his eyes. The babies had been born in this house, at Werneth Heights. Away from prying eyes, from gossip. Two perfect children, born to two perfect parents. The house had been so big it had presented no problem for all of them to live under one roof. Catherine and her family had had one wing, he and Alwyn had had the other; shared it with Dorothy, their other daughter.
The rain slapped against the window, Arnold’s spirits dipping into melancholia as the memory took its toll … David had been under strain, overworking – nothing serious, but Catherine had been demanding, highly strung at times, and petulant with him. She had wanted all her husband’s attention, all the time. Had put him before their children, always.
It had been a bad winter that year too. Rain had come on rain, the streets greasy, the town flat with grey water. In the factories and workshops the winter had dragged on cold, the workers grumbling, David taking on more and more of the workload … Arnold shifted in his seat. Damn it, his son-in-law had asked for more responsibility! It hadn’t been foisted upon him. David had wanted it.
But wanting it and being able to cope with it were two different things, and before long David’s good looks had been mottled with lines and shadows. At times, even his natural kindness had been replaced with bouts of irritation. He’d become snappy, restless.
And Catherine had been so demanding. She had pleaded with him for more time, more money, more attention. Could he go away with her and the children? Could they buy a house of their own? She would be happy. No, he had told her, wisely, you would be lonely. So we’ll stay here, Catherine had countered. All right, all right … A day later she had been off again: I want to move. No, I want to stay. It would be better for the children if we lived elsewhere. No, it’s better for them here.
Make up your mind, David had told her, exasperated. Arnold had agreed with him. If you want to leave Werneth Heights, wait for a while until I get the new mill up and running and then I’ll have more time. We’ll move then …
Catherine had kissed him fiercely, moist eyes on his, a supple body pressed against his own, her own father embarrassed, turning away at the show of passion.
‘I love you David,’ she had whispered. ‘Love me, always love me, won’t you?’
Judge Arnold had beat a hasty retreat back to his own wing, but not before he had heard the uncomfortable sounds of lovemaking begin. Catherine’s urgency obviously irritated and excited David at the same time. Heat, passion and annoyance all pooling together on the other side of The Dower House.
Closing the connecting door, Judge Arnold had leaned against it. He could still hear his daughter’s hurried words. Love me always, David. Love me always. I couldn’t live without you. If you left me I would kill myself …
At dinner that night Catherine had been subdued, sated. David had talked business with his father-in-law. The storm had passed. Again. But Judge had felt the air pulse with tension and had glanced repeatedly towards his child.
