Prue Phillipson - Hordens of Horden Hall (11 page)

“I was a student with this man – Anthony Sparrow – and he has held a fellowship there for some years. I sent him examples of the theological studies you have done at home and of your proficiency in Latin and Greek. He says he is impressed but would wish of course to examine you himself when you come –”

“When I come! Oh father! But how? The cost –”

“I have been plain with him about my circumstances but there are sons there of other poor clergy. You would not be alone among the sizars and he is prepared to enter you for a bursary after your first term if you show promise.”

“Sizars?”

“They are the lowliest rank of student, below commoners. They make a living waiting upon others. This is a regular practice and no disgrace –”

“Oh sir, never suppose I would object to that. To be at Cambridge. To study! You knew well that if anything could ever help me to bear the horrible loss of Daniel, this was it. And you have been secretly working for it since my return, amidst your own sorrow.” Tears overcame him and he flung his arms about his father’s neck. They clung together for a long minute till Nat relinquished him and asked “But, oh, sir, can I leave you alone with my mother and no servant?”

His father’s moist eyes beamed at him. “Nay, I can take Jenny back now that my stipend has come and the workmen have been paid off and I will not have a hearty young man to feed. Only love the place and your studies as I did and I will be happy. It will be hard, but you are not used to luxury like some young men and I am certain you will avoid the drink and gambling which are the curse of student life.”

“I can promise you that on my life. But how will I get to Cambridge? I would walk the whole way, but if I am truly to take up a place there I should arrive soon, should I not?”

“You will hire a horse. I have had a small sum of money laid up for that purpose ever since I saw you were good at your books. You should have gone two or three years ago but for your own reluctance to leave Daniel.”

“And my mother’s reluctance to have anything spent on me that could not also be spent on Daniel.”

“I acknowledge that, but be not bitter towards her on that account. She needed to lavish love on him and he repaid it a hundredfold without question. You were so forward as a small child that you swiftly outgrew her ministrations and I think she felt almost intimidated by your sharpness.”

“But I was afraid of her anger. I always have been.”

“But you didn’t resent her love for Daniel?”

“No, because Daniel was so devoted to me.”

“Indeed, he almost worshipped you. He marvelled at your cleverness and when you loved him back he was for ever grateful.”

“I did love him. I loved him with a passion. I hope he knew how much –” Nat’s voice shook. He grabbed the log basket again and moved outside.

His father checked him a moment. “I may be mistaken but I think that that intense brotherly love and constant companionship kept you from looking at young women by way of love. When you are away from home you will have many temptations in that direction, but I trust you can keep yourself chaste till you can enter the ministry and take a suitable wife from these parts.”

Nat smiled through the tears in his eyes. “I would lie if I said I have never lusted after a woman, but I will endeavour to keep your council with God’s help.”

He opened the kitchen door and found his mother standing bewildered in the middle of the room still wearing her bed gown.

“I have slept long,” she said. “I think I am befuddled with sleep.” She looked about the room and out of the window. “Where is Daniel?” she asked.

CHAPTER 8

Bel sat on her travelling trunk in the hall, waiting for the coach to be brought round. She could feel nothing, neither regret, fear, curiosity nor excitement. She was a parcel, a mere lump of the life of this place called Horden Hall which was to be removed, carted away and set down in a strange place called Cranmore House.

Her father appeared holding a letter in his hand. His eyebrows were drawn together. “I regret, Arabella,” he said, standing in front of her but with his attention hardly on her at all, “that a matter has come up demanding my attention. I will not be able to accompany you to Yorkshire. Robert has agreed to be your escort.” Hearing her little snort of dismay he met her eyes briefly. “It may be that you will come home at Christmas time, but that depends a great deal on yourself.” With difficulty he gave her a smile and a pat on the head. Then he crossed the hall and walked into the room he used as an estate office and shut the door.

That’s it, she thought. That is my farewell from my father. She recalled the day he had waved off his wife and Henrietta with great ceremony. I am nothing, an encumbrance. And to have Robert for the journey!

She could hear the horses as the coach was brought to the front door. Nurse came bustling down the stairs with a coarse linen bag containing Bel’s winter mittens and a short hooded cloak. “Keep it with you inside. It’s mild enough this morning but it may turn. Stand up, then. Here’s Tom to carry your trunk out.” She looked her up and down. “Eh, well, you seem harmless enough just now, but I pray God they’ll never let you near a pair of scissors. Go on with you. It’s a happy day for me, for I’m to retire with a pension to my own wee cottage.” She gave her a little push to follow Tom and the trunk. “I suppose I should see you tucked in, since you’re the last through my hands, but you’ve been the hardest. Maybe I’m getting too old for bairns.”

Bel clambered in and took the bag from her. If a word had been said about a goodbye kiss, she thought she would have burst into tears, so she said nothing and Nurse just leant in and pulled the rug over her knees and exclaimed, “Now, where’s Master Robert?”

Robert came stalking round the house from the stables. “I thought we were to ride,” he said to Nurse. “She could have got up behind me on Caesar and the trunk could have gone by carrier. I hate sitting in the coach.” He got in, all thin elbows and knees, and scowled at Bel.

This protest was nonsense she knew because his own bag was already on top for the overnight halts that would be needed before they reached their destination. With no more fuss they trotted forward. She turned her head where the drive swept round and looked back at the Hall trying to feel something for the place, even with its ugly ostentatious statue in front. The tall rosy brick chimneys were catching a gleam of sunlight between clouds but the rest of the house, built of local stone to save money she had been told, looked sombre and forbidding. As well as the internal work Sir Ralph had had a new façade built and Bel had often heard from their father that his ancestor had sought his baronetcy on the strength of his improved mansion.

“We’ll be giving this up, I shouldn’t wonder,” Robert said, twitching impatiently on the seat.

“What? The Hall?” she was surprised into asking.

“No, goose, the coach. It costs seventy pounds a year for farrier’s charges and Tom’s wages and livery. It’s devilish being short of ready money for necessities.”

“Are we poor suddenly, then? And of course
my
fault I suppose – twenty-five pounds for this school.”

“That’s a pity, too.”

“Is there more trouble in the letter Father got this morning?”

“He’s anxious about it, yes. But I’ve advised him to do nothing yet. In truth, I am minded to deal with it myself. I might seize the chance when we’re in Yorkshire.”

“I suppose you’re not going to tell me what it is.” As she had with Henrietta Bel marvelled that Robert was holding any sort of conversation with her but she was afraid that the very rarity of the event and the prickliness of their relationship would soon bring it to an end.

He shrugged. “It’s of no import, really. It’s just unlucky that the father of the villain he hanged for the rick-burning turns out to be a parson.”

Bel felt her skin creep and crinkle. She fought with all her might to show no reaction. But Robert was insensitive to the effect of his words.

He went on, “They’ve appealed to the Court of the North in York for a commission of some sort to investigate the circumstances.”

The coach went over a stone in the road and he swore. “You see, Caesar would have avoided that.”

Bel had shut her eyes but swiftly opened them again to stare at the blur of hedgerows passing by. She knew now from long nights awake, that darkness conjured up the gallows picture too well. She saw her brother’s sharp nose and chin pointed towards her.

“What do you care about such matters from a man’s world? I’m only telling you because Father may be fined for not following due legal procedures. So don’t start writing home for feminine fol de rols, laces and ribbons and perfumes and such. I know you’d chop them up if they were Hen’s, but in a year or two you’ll be wanting them yourself, if I know anything about young women.” His sneering laugh implied he knew a great deal.

Bel took several slow breaths to get her voice under control. Then she brought out in a rush, “Does this parson live in Yorkshire, then?”

Robert raised his thin black eyebrows. Everything about him was thin and sharp. If he grows a beard when he’s older, she thought, it’ll be a little spike of a thing.

He shrugged again. “I believe so, but Father is hoping the King’s business will take everyone’s attention at present. He’s minded to do nothing till he has talked to his lawyer, but I say this is as good a time as any. Lord Strafford will hardly look at it himself and if I can grease the palm of some lesser official, it will never go higher. Father is useless at managing these things. He thinks he must send a copy of the transcript of the proceedings, but it was that old Dame Leary in the village that wrote it down and who was she to have a hand in any law business, they’ll be asking.”

Bel was bursting to say that it was Robert himself who had incited the mob to the hanging and taken the outcome out of their father’s hands, but she was afraid to betray how much she knew. All the same, she must keep Robert talking.

“What is the King’s business you speak of?”

“What d’you think, numbskull? Getting the Scots’ army out of England, of course. He’s called all his peers to a Council in York to work out a peace treaty. Lord Strafford had to hot-foot it from Ireland, but he is Lord President of the North as well as Lord Deputy in Ireland. Can you imagine a man like that – in conference with his King on state matters – taking any notice of a letter from some country parson about a dim-witted son who got himself hanged for looting and rick-firing?”

“I see,” she murmured. But she was not convinced that nothing would be done. One thing her father had conveyed to her all her childhood was the sanctity of the laws of England. He regarded his duties as a magistrate with great solemnity and his troubled face that morning showed plainly that he took the letter he had received very seriously indeed. She was sure that if some law commissioner from the Court of the North was sent to find out the whole truth of the incident, they would eventually unearth the identity of the fat boy and a constable would be sent to Cranmore House to arrest her. Perhaps that would be a huge relief. Perhaps they would hang her and she wouldn’t have to go on living in this present hell. Unless the hell afterwards was all too real and horrible ...

When she lapsed into silence she realised after a while that Robert had too. She peered at him and saw his head inclined back into the padded corner and his eyes shut. She had never seen him asleep before. It was disconcerting but faintly exciting, giving her a strange sort of power over him. To keep her thoughts from his news she studied him. His short travelling cloak lay open showing his doublet of soft kid leather, embroidered with a fine black pattern of flowers and leaves in satin stitch. She was sure it had been expensive. The shirt showing in the front and through the slashed sleeve seams was of the finest linen and the falling collar was trimmed with the best lace. Protruding from it his scrawny neck and prominent Adam’s apple looked slightly disgusting. The thinness of his legs was hidden by his breeches which were tied above his boots by purple ribbons. New shirts, ribbons and laces would be the necessities he had spoken of just now. As she considered him he shifted about and settled again with his back to her which seemed to express perfectly the relationship they had always had.

He is my brother, she reflected, and I really loathe him. What is the verse in the Bible? He that hateth his brother is in darkness. That’s me, I am in darkness. And as a murderer I can never hope for anything else. She longed to sleep too, if only it could be without nightmares.

Nat had been a week in Cambridge and was still overwhelmed by the size of the city and its College buildings of such antiquity and beauty. He gazed up at the intricate timber roof of the hall of Queen’s College, in awe at the workmanship. What was he, a poor parson’s son from Yorkshire, doing in this magnificent place? And what am I doing anywhere without Daniel, he asked himself constantly, especially at morning prayers in the College chapel as the familiar liturgy washed over him. Father hoped new scenes would soothe my grief, but I need to feel Daniel’s hand creep into mine and that smile light his face as he asks, “Daniel safe now?” I was his bulwark in strange places and his trust was my happiness, my confidence. Can I endure it here, alone, without him? And how did he endure those last hours of his without me? Why did I agree to join the army with him?

If only Mother hadn’t called me ‘the runt’ and said I would grow up a “helpless weakling” like Father! I hated her to say that but I think she made me despise Father sometimes – God forgive me. Now I despise myself. Perhaps I am a coward. I couldn’t bear the thought of a man impaled on my pike. I could feel it entering my own guts. I could feel it for Daniel. If I had said the Scots were evil men maybe he would have fought them but noise and conflict bewildered him and I believe he would have sat down and covered his ears in the midst of a battle. I knew that and yet I was too afraid of Mother to refuse to go. If I had been brave enough to take a stand against her, Daniel could be alive today.