Blood Brothers (7 page)

‘Get your coat off and wash them mucky hands.’ Nancy could smell the oil from the tractor engine. ‘Your brother’s upstairs, so make sure the pair of you leave the bathroom as you found it!’

While the brothers were away, Nancy and Alice put the finishing touches to the table.

Alice thought she had never seen such an amazing spread. She felt proud of herself for having helped. Moreover, she had loved working in the kitchen with Nancy, because she taught her so much more than her mother had ever done.

The table was laden with a feast. There was a plump joint of best beef waiting to be sliced by Tom, and various dishes of steaming-hot vegetables. There were roast potatoes golden brown and dripping with meat juices; boiled potatoes dressed with butter and herbs; fresh green peas, carrots and light, fluffy cauliflower. The baby Yorkshire puddings were all soft and melting on the inside, while the outsides were brown and crispy.

A few minutes later everyone was round the table. Joe was about to start, when his mother caught his attention. ‘Not yet, son,’ she chided. ‘Have you forgotten your manners?’

Joe was shocked. ‘I forgot!’ He apologised with a sheepish grin. ‘Looks like I’ve been away too long, eh?’

Frank leapt at the opportunity to make a sly comment, ‘Shame on you, Joe.’ He gave him a knowing glance. ‘What kind of company have you been keeping? Don’t they say grace where you’ve been!’

Joe might have made some discreet retaliation, but unwittingly his father did it for him. ‘Enough of that, Frank.’ He gave his eldest son a stern look. ‘I seem to recall a few weeks back, someone
else
forgot to wait for grace, didn’t you, Frank?’

Reassuring Joe with an easy smile he admitted, ‘It’s not every family in the land gives thanks for what they’ve got, and that’s all right; but we’re farming stock, and throughout the generations it is something we care to do.’

He then checked to make sure everyone was ready, before folding his hands on the table.

It took only a moment for Tom to offer gratitude on all their behalfs. ‘We thank thee Lord for this plentiful food and the roof over our heads, and for bringing Joe home to us. Amen.’

Afterwards, when they were all tucking in, Nancy asked Alice, ‘So, what else did your father have to say, Alice luv?’

‘Just that I was to stay here tonight if that was all right with you, and go home tomorrow. I’m to look in my wardrobe at the things Mother bought. You recall I told you, she went out to buy my shoes and veil? Oh and I’m to look at page fourteen of the leaflet on the table, because she hopes I like the bouquet she’s chosen.’

‘What!’ Tom was astounded. ‘I always thought it was the
bride
’s prerogative to choose her bouquet?’ He stuffed a potato in his mouth and began chewing.

Nancy brought him up sharply. ‘Tom!’

‘What?’

‘It’s none of your business who chooses the bouquet, or anything else.’

‘I never said it was.’

‘Besides, how do you know it wasn’t
Alice
’s idea for her mother to choose her bouquet?’

‘It was not my idea,’ Alice offered, ‘but mother said if she was paying out a fortune on my wedding, she had every right to do some of the choosing.’ She gave a sad little smile. ‘To be honest though, I don’t think that’s why. I think it’s because she never had a white wedding of her own.’

‘Why was that?’ Frank was learning more about his future wife and family, with every passing day.

Alice explained, ‘She told me that she and Father decided not to spend money on fripperies, and that it would be far better to invest the money in their first restaurant.’

‘I think they did right,’ Frank declared. ‘After all, look how they’ve used that money. Three restaurants up to now, and all because they started that first one with money that could have been wasted on paying for a big, fancy wedding.’

While Alice pondered sadly on his remarks, Nancy said she would have much preferred a white wedding, ‘…with all the trimmings, like me and Tom had.’ She was quick to assure them, ‘It was nothing posh mind, but I had the loveliest dress and we paid for the choir to sing in church. We hired the village hall for the best party ever, with a pianist and a flautist and we danced all night long.’

Sighing wistfully, she reminded Tom, ‘It was the best day ever, wasn’t it, Tom?’

Tom readily agreed, but added, ‘To my mind, Alice’s parents did right. They made a first-class business decision. That’s why they now own three of the best eating places in the area.

‘My own story is not so straightforward. Y’see, my father
once owned all the land adjacent to this farm-cottage, only he fell on hard times and had to sell a good part of it. Fortunately, he arranged to rent back some acres and the cottage…’

‘That’s enough now, Tom!’ Nancy often had to check him when he was being too forthright.

Joe had a pertinent question for Frank. ‘So, if it was you, and you had a choice, you’d really go without a white wedding, and invest the money in a business, would you?’

‘Too right I would!’ Frank was adamant.

‘In that case, I reckon it’s just as well that it’s the
bride
’s family who are paying for yours and Alice’s wedding.’

Frank nodded unashamedly. ‘That’s right. If it was coming out of
my
pocket, there’d be no fancy clothes, no big church do with a hundred people wanting to be fed and feted. Oh no! We’d be in and out of the registry office; a meal back at the house, then a few days looking about for a new and exciting enterprise.’

Glancing over at Alice, he smiled encouragingly. ‘You agree with me don’t you, eh? You and me, setting out on our first big adventure together?’

Alice gave him her best smile. ‘Sounds exciting,’ she said brightly, as though she actually agreed. But she did
not
agree. And as she looked up she caught Joe’s eyes. It was as if he could see right into her soul. She flushed slightly and looked away.

Unaware of the change in atmosphere, Frank went on glibly, ‘But it’s
not
my money, so now that my future in-laws have amassed their fortune they can splash it about all they like; if they want to give me and Alice the best wedding that money can buy that’s up to them!’

Across the table from Alice, Joe saw how Frank’s insensitive babble had dampened Alice’s bright and sunny nature. He wished there was something he could do to bring back her smile. But he couldn’t. That was Frank’s role in her life now.

With Frank’s embarrassing and thoughtless remarks out of the way, Nancy turned her mind elsewhere. ‘By the way, Joe?’

Joe looked up. ‘Yes?’

‘With Alice staying here again tonight, you’ll need to sleep on the sofa. Is that all right?’

‘Absolutely!’ He was just glad she wasn’t going home yet. ‘The sofa will be just fine.’

‘Good! That’s settled then.’

Marred only by Frank’s damning words about white weddings, the next hour proved to be the most pleasant Joe had spent in a long time. The meal was wholesome and delicious, and with the conversation focusing on local events in the farming calendar, he began to feel as though he had never been away.

Nancy had something to show them. ‘Now then, look at this, everyone!’ Grinning from ear to ear, she held up the leaflet. ‘I got this from the post office in Blackhill,’ she informed them. ‘It’s the information for the Spring barn-dance in the village hall.’

‘Give over, woman!’ Tom reminded her. ‘We’ve no time for dancing. You know as well as I do…Spring is a busy time on the farm, what with lambing an’ all. Besides, in case it’s slipped your mind, we’ve a wedding to go to!’

Nancy shook the leaflet in his face. ‘Ah, but the dance isn’t for another three weeks, and anyway it’s been carefully planned to work with the farming calendar,’ she added triumphantly. ‘We all know how much you hate these events, and how you make every excuse not to go dancing. Well,
we’re
all going, aren’t we, folks?’ She waved the leaflet in the air.

‘I would love to go,’ Alice said, excitedly.

‘Oh, well if Alice is going, then so am I.’ Frank did not want
other men anywhere near her. Alice was a prize he meant to hang on to.

Joe, too, was all for it, though for different reasons. ‘Well, I’m raring to go!’ he told Nancy. ‘I haven’t been to a village dance in a long time, and now I’m really looking forward to it.’

‘Aha!’ Nancy was jubilant. ‘So there ye have it, Tom Arnold,’ she told him. ‘We’re all going and so are you. It’s either that, or you cook your own meals for the next six months.’

‘Have sense, woman!’ Tom groaned. ‘I’ve a gammy leg, in case you’ve forgotten!’

‘I have not forgotten,’ she answered. ‘But gammy leg or no gammy leg, you’d best get yourself to that village hall with the rest of us, and no argument. You can sit it out and sulk if yer afraid to join in, ‘cause it’ll make no difference to me.’

She gave him a shrivelling glance. ‘Besides, you’ve never once danced with me in public anyway, and only once in private, and that was on our wedding night when you were blind drunk and couldn’t care less who saw you.’

‘That’s not a nice thing to say.’

‘Mebbe not, but I don’t reckon it’s nice if you’re ashamed of dancing with your own wife in public.’

‘Don’t be daft, ‘course I’m not ashamed.’

‘Yes you are. I know it, you know it, and everybody in this village knows it.’

Tom actually had a flush of conscience. ‘All right then, Nancy Arnold. If it’s dancing yer want, it’s dancing you’ll get, but it’ll be your doing if this old leg gives up the ghost.’

Alice clapped her hands and gave him a kiss. ‘You’ll enjoy it,’ she promised.

Nancy’s face was wreathed in a broad, happy smile. ‘That’s settled then, husband.’ And flushing with pleasure, she laid the leaflet on the table.

When Joe picked it up, she told him with a twinkle in her eye, ‘I expect the girls will be swarming all over you. In fact
it wouldn’t surprise me if you didn’t find yourself a really nice girlfriend. That Rosalind Thompson always had an eye for you, and she’s still not wed. Oh, she’s had a few men-friends but nothing’s ever come of it.’

Frank chipped in, ‘That’s because she only ever wants what she can get from them, then when their pockets are empty, she dumps them and moves on to the next victim. No wonder they call her the shark; given half a chance, she’ll eat you for breakfast and spit out the pips!’

Joe laughed. ‘She won’t be interested in
me
then,’ he quipped, ‘I’ve got nothing worth the taking.’

‘
You
said it, not me,’ Frank said spitefully. ‘Anyway, like I said, Rosalind Thompson doesn’t want a serious relationship.’

Tom spoke without thinking, ‘As I recall, didn’t
you
have a bit of a fling with her at one time?’

Frank laughed it off. ‘Not really. She might have wanted to get her claws into me, but I’m nobody’s fool. I soon told her where to get off.’ He smiled at Alice and was relieved when she smiled back.

He was furious with his father for mentioning the embarrassing fling he had had with that Thompson bitch.

Truth be told, it was Rosalind who unceremoniously dumped him, and not the other way round. He was heartbroken, until he found Alice Jacobs.

Frank had always been careful to make Alice believe she was the only one.

He had no intention of letting her find out that she was his consolation prize.

The conversation changed direction and continued over dinner, with Tom and Nancy having the occasional teasing dig at each other, and Alice thoroughly enoying their company.

Frank assailed them all with talk of his ambitions to have his very own farm, ‘…with a hundred acres of prime, crop-growing land; another fifty acres of pasture, and a stable filled with top quality horses straight from Ireland. I’ll build us a fine house and hire enough experienced men to run the place, while the two of us travel the world,’ he told Alice.

Joe was impressed at the scale of his brother’s ambitions; though he was naturally dubious. ‘So, how d’you intend funding this amazingly extravagant enterprise?’

Frank resented his question. ‘Why, from Alice’s
parents
of course.’

Alice was shocked. Like the others, she had no inkling that he was making such plans. ‘You mustn’t rely on my parents, Frank,’ she cautioned him gently.

‘Why not?’ Unlike the others, Frank was surprised and irritated by her remark.

‘You don’t know what they’re like where money’s concerned, or you would never have included them in your plans.’

She revealed a snippet of information. ‘The only person they ever helped was my sister Pauline. She was always naturally good at hairdressing, and she learned her trade well. When her employer was ready to sell up, he offered it to Pauline, and she asked Mother to buy it for her. You see, it was always Mother’s dream to own a hairdressing salon for the well-off. So she went along with Pauline’s business plan, and it was a huge success. There are five salons now, right across the county. Father is tied up with his own business, so it’s Pauline who oversees them. She works long and hard because she revels in it. But the deeds to each and every shop are all in Mother’s name.’

Worried, she glanced at the others. ‘I’m really sorry,’ she apologised, ‘but it’s best if Frank knows the way things are.’

‘So the hairdresser’s shops are all in your mother’s name, but what does that matter to us?’ Frank persisted, ‘I’m talking
about a loan, a safe, secure loan for something I know inside out. I’m a mature man, tried and tested, and as far as I know, neither of your parents know the first thing about farming the land, or raising animals, or anything else that makes a farmer’s day. Now then, Alice my love, am I right, or am I not?’

Frank did not appreciate having his plans cruelly dashed, especially in front of everyone.

‘Yes, you’re right, of course you are,’ Alice answered kindly. ‘But
you
had your father to share the load, and I’m sure he taught you everything you know. The way my parents will see it, is they had no one to lead or teach them; they had to learn the ropes the hard way, on their own with little or no guidance. They’ll tell you how they had to make sacrifices in order to get their first business off the ground, and that they did it themselves without asking help from anyone.’