Seasons of Love (3 page)

Chalk-white now, she gulped for air, could find none and as the room turned black and whirled around her, she slid to the floor in a faint.

For a moment, neither of her parents moved, then Mrs Merling looked at her husband.

‘Leave her!’ he ordered. ‘
He that toucheth pitch shall be defiled therewith
!’

After a few moments Helen struggled back to consciousness, to find herself lying on the floor, her head aching where she’d bumped it on a chair. She looked round, not understanding what had happened, then, as she saw her parents watching her, she remembered and terror filled her again.

She closed her eyes, but the silence continued, so she opened them again and tried to sit up.

Neither of them made an attempt to help her up, and her father stood looking down at her with that cold disgusted expression which she so often saw on his face. Only it was worse this time.

She pulled herself to her feet, but the room was still lurching around her and she had to sit down abruptly on the nearest chair or fall over again.

She didn’t cry. When had weeping ever softened his heart? Instead, she tried to come to terms with the idea that she might be expecting a child. How did one get with child? Was it, could it be -

the loving? What a wonderful way to beget a child!

When she looked as if she might be able to answer sensibly, Mr Merling repeated his questions.

‘Who is the man? Who has got you with child?’

Helen was jerked out of a brief rosy dream of a son who looked exactly like Robert. She shook her head numbly. Her father would be so furious when he found out she had been meeting an actor. She had hoped Robert would come with her to tell her family they wanted to marry. It would have been safer for her. She had decided to ask him about it next week, for the company would soon be leaving Stowby and she wanted to go with them.

Slowly Septimus Merling unfastened his belt. He strode round his desk, caught his daughter by the shoulder and pulled her to her knees in front of him.

Helen didn’t plead or protest, for she knew what was coming. As she braced herself for pain, the belt descended upon her back. At first she held in her cries, then she began to gasp and moan, for he had never hit her so hard before.

‘Father, don’t!’ she begged. ‘Let me - ’ Another blow stopped her short and it was so hard she whimpered in pain.

‘You shall scream before I’m done,’ he muttered. ‘Scream out the name of your seducer. I shall cleanse you of this evil, whatever it takes to do so. You shall not follow in my mother’s footsteps.’

Helen struggled to get away, but he was a strong man and had no trouble holding her down.

And in the end she did scream each time the belt descended.

Eventually Bertha Merling came round the desk and took her husband’s arm. ‘She cannot bear any more, Septimus.’

He breathed deeply and closed his eyes for a moment, then shook his daughter hard. ‘Confess your sins, you whore of Babylon.
Who - is - the - man?
’

Helen was in such a haze of pain that she could hardly thing straight. ‘Robert. Robert Perriman.’

‘I know of no such person. You’re lying.’ He hit her again.

Desperate, she shrieked, ‘I’m not. He’s an actor. I met him in Stowby.’

For a moment, Septimus let her go, holding on to the edge of the desk as shock made him suddenly weak. Then he seized her again. ‘Dear God! The shame of it! An actor! At least my mother ran away with a gentleman.’

Bertha left the room, holding a handkerchief to her eyes.

Only when his daughter lost consciousness did he stop and push her away from him with his foot. He threw the blood-stained belt down and sank into his chair, trembling still with rage.

As he came to his senses and realised what he had done, he was not only angry at her for her sin, but angry with himself for losing his temper, for demeaning himself like that.

In the end, he walked out to seek refuge in his church. As he passed his wife in the hall, he said curtly, ‘You may tend her now, then lock her in her bedroom.’

As he knelt before the altar, he felt no pity for his daughter. Like his mother, she had placed herself beyond forgiveness. Now, she and her shame must be sent away from Dendleford for ever.

And as quickly as possible.

When Helen regained her senses, she was lying on her bed face down, with the maid, Mary, bathing her back. ‘Lie still, miss. I’ll try not to hurt you, but we have to get the pieces of your shift out of the wounds or they’ll fester.’

Mary bent to her work, disgust filling her, and anger too. This decided it. She’d been wondering whether to give notice at quarter day. Now she would definitely do that. The man was a monster. He’d always been a nasty piece of work, for all his show of piety, but he’d gone quite mad today.

And the mistress never said him nay, not even today when her daughter was being beaten senseless. Mary had peeped through the kitchen door and seen Mrs Merling standing in the hall, wincing as she listened to the screams.

She was a poor kind of mother, a broken reed of a woman. But Mary didn’t have to stay here and put up with such things. She had a little money saved and could leave the village for good, move on somewhere a bit livelier. And she wouldn’t keep her mouth closed about what had happened today, either. She definitely wouldn’t.

The pain was so bad that Helen groaned and writhed, soon fainting again. Which was a good thing, because Mary managed to get the back clean before the poor girl came to her senses again.

It was no wonder she’d got pregnant, because they’d kept her completely ignorant of life. And in spite of their mean, carping ways, she’d been a nice child, always polite and grateful for any bit of attention. She wasn’t like her brother, that was for sure, for he had resembled his father even at the age of five, and he grew more like him as he grew older. Two nasty creatures they were.

When she’d finished, Mary covered the poor girl with a cotton sheet and left her to sleep. Then she went into the village, ostensibly to buy some sugar, but actually to spread the tale.

For days Helen lay in a haze of agony, tended only by the maid. The wonder was, as Mary told her cronies, the poor lass didn’t lose the baby. She’d be scarred for life where the buckle had bit in, though. As if girls weren’t always getting themselves pregnant, for nature would out. And where was the harm, as long as the fellows married them?

The villagers lost no time in spreading the news more widely afield. For all his piety, the parson wasn’t liked in Dendleford.

For most of the days that followed Helen was alone, locked in the attic, too weak even to sit up.

She had no idea what was to happen to her.

Time passed very slowly. She listened to the sounds of the household going about its daily tasks below her and escaped from time to time into her memories. Neither of her parents made any attempt to see her.

And although Mary was quite kind to her, she’d whispered that she’d been told not to speak a single word to her and then said no more.

As she grew a little better, Helen tried to make plans to escape. She had to let Robert know what had happened. Mary was the only one who could help her, the only one who could get a message out to him. The next time the maid came to tend her back, she whispered, ‘Can you take a message to Stowby for me?’

Mary shook her head immediately and glanced over her shoulder. ‘I daren’t, Miss Helen.’

‘But you’re my only hope. If we don’t tell Robert, he won’t be able to rescue me.’

Her father’s voice boomed up the stairs. ‘Mary! I hope you’re not talking to that sinner.’

‘Oh no, sir. She was just moaning as I dressed her back.’

There were footsteps on the stairs and a shadow fell across the bed. Helen didn’t even try to see who it was. She knew those footsteps.

When Mary had gone back downstairs and the key had grated in the lock, Helen wept, silently into her pillow. That night she touched the blackest point in her whole life and afterwards she lost hope, refusing to eat, for what was the point?

Life continued as it always had for the other members of the household, following the rigid pattern set by the master. As she listened to the noises from below, Helen thought it was as if she had ceased to exist. Downstairs the mornings still began with prayers in the parlour. Her father’s voice had a peculiarly penetrating nasal quality and twice a day, she heard him praying for the Lord’s continued blessings upon his family and household.

Her mind wandered from one idea to the next. Why he should think them blessed by the Lord was a thing she had never been able to understand. She knew that, unlike her brother, she had always been a great disappointment to him, the cross he had to bear, for he had never hesitated to tell her so. Her older brother was a model son, who had recently followed his father into the church and gained his first position as a curate.

Edward was as poor as any villager, they all were, but he was just as proud as his father. And he disapproved of his sister almost as much as his parents did.

‘Why?’ she moaned to herself as she tried to find a more comfortable position in the stuffy little room. ‘Why do they all hate me so? And why are we so very poor?’ A village as small as Dendleford couldn’t provide lavishly for its parson, but Helen knew that the Merlings were connections of Lord Northby on her paternal grandmother’s side. Yet they were never invited to dine at Northby Castle, which lay just west of Stowby, the largest town in the district, nor had his lordship made any attempt to help his relative to a more substantial living.

Perhaps when she was better, she could run away and obtain employment as a companion to an old lady? Or even get a position as a maidservant. Anything would be preferable to staying here.

Or best of all, she thought, as she lay there, still dizzy with pain, Robert would come and rescue her and carry her far, far away from Dendleford. Only he didn’t know she needed rescuing, or he would surely have come for her by now. If she could find some way to escape, they could run away together and get married. For if she stayed, if she did have her child in Dendleford, her father would make its life as miserable as hers had been.

Then her thoughts came to an abrupt halt. The idea that there was a baby to consider was terrifying. It would stop her finding work. You had to stay home and look after babies. She smiled in spite of her pain. She loved babies. They were such warm little creatures and smelled so sweet if you looked after them properly. She’d held them many a time when she and her mother were making parish visits. They always smiled at her.

Then she frowned as something else occurred to her. How did one have the baby, anyway?

Was it - was it like the cat having kittens? Helen fingered her stomach and wished desperately that she wasn’t so ignorant. She’d asked her mother once about such things, and received such a tongue lashing for her immodesty that she had never asked again.

Oh, if only Robert would come for her! Why did he not come? She didn’t know how many days had passed since their last meeting, but surely he would be wondering what had happened to her? Surely he would make inquiries?

When Helen had recovered somewhat, Septimus Merling rode over to Stowby to take counsel of Lord Northby, who was a Justice of the Peace, as well as a relative. When he got to the Hall, he sent in a terse note, saying there was trouble in the family.

His lordship stared at the scrap of paper and made a disgusted noise. ‘Damn fellow! I suppose you’d better show him in, Barns.’ His valet had already told him about the beating, which had become quite a scandal in the district. And since no one had seen Miss Merling since, there were even folk who said the father had beaten her to death.

Basil Northby thought badly of a man who would treat his own daughter so harshly. The man’s father had been just as bad and he’d wondered at the time how his cousin Rosamund could ever have married John Merling, for the fellow had nothing but looks to recommend him. It might be reprehensible, but after she’d run away, Lord Northby had always nursed a secret hope that sin might have made her happier than virtue and prayers ever had.

Septimus was shown into the room and made his usual fuss, bowing and scraping.

‘Get on with it, man!’ snapped His Lordship. ‘You said there was trouble in the family.’

Septimus sighed. ‘I fear so, my lord.’ He explained the horrifying situation, then bent his head to await judgement.

Lord Northby nodded slowly. ‘Hmm. She’ll have to be married off, then. Is there some local fellow who might take her or do you want her to wed the actor?’ Was this the only reason for the beating? What did the fellow think young girls were? Saints?

Septimus reared back, affronted. ‘I don’t want her living anywhere near Dendleford. All I wish is to ensure that she marries the rogue, for the sake of the child. After that, I shall have nothing more to do with her.’

No, you’d never think of helping someone! thought his noble relative, pinching his nose. ‘Very well, then,’ he said at last. ‘I’ll go and see this scoundrel myself.’

‘We’ll be extremely grateful for your help, My Lord. Extremely. We - ’

‘I’ll find out what his intentions are and let you know.’

He got up to signify the interview was at an end. As he said to his wife later, the poor girl would probably be better off married and away from that canting hypocrite, with his penchant for beating helpless women.

The interview with Robert Perriman was conducted in the best parlour of the Angel Inn, to which the actor had been summoned peremptorily by a message from his lordship.

‘What’s that about?’ demanded Rugely, the ageing actor-manager, who was there when the summons came. ‘Is there some trouble, Perriman?’

Robert shrugged. ‘I have no idea.’ But he did have an idea. The girl had stopped coming to the woods, and she hadn’t been at the market, either, last week, for Robert had made careful inquiries.

The parents must have found out, then. Pity. There were still a few weeks to go in the town. But good things never lasted.

But he’d have had to leave her behind, anyway, at the end of the month. So perhaps, it had saved him the trouble and tears of a parting. For he’d no intention of getting married and been secretly amused when she just assumed they would wed. He’d never met anyone as naive as Helen Merling, poor little bitch. Hardly knew what colour the sky was, that one, hadn’t even asked for presents, just a show of affection.