Someone Special (72 page)

‘Matt never breathed a word of any of this,’ Hester said flatly. ‘If he had, what a deal of unhappiness would have been saved!’

‘Hester, will you let me finish?’ Mr Geraint said testily. ‘Since you obviously don’t know the story, the least you can do is listen to me.’

‘
I’ll
listen,’ Nell said softly. ‘Go on, Mr Geraint.’

‘Very well. I was born exactly ten years before Matthew, and despite the difference in our ages we became good friends. When I inherited Pengarth I told father I wanted the Coburns to take over the lodge – they were elderly by then and more or less retired – so that young Matthew could work for me as my farm manager. He knew a great deal about farming, did Matt, and I needed him badly, his loyalty and support as much as his knowledge perhaps.’

‘And you both came here and started to turn Pengarth into a good estate and a reasonable home,’ Nell put in. ‘But then you lied to my mother and broke up Matthew’s marriage and when you were bored with this place, you just left. It’s a pretty disreputable story, Mr Geraint, no matter how you tell it.’

In the back of her mind her new knowledge throbbed like a fresh wound; Hester had deliberately told her she and Dan were brother and sister not because she believed it but because she did not want them to marry. And I felt dirty whenever I thought about Dan after that, Nell remembered. We made love to each other at the farmhouse before I knew, and that was dirtied too, made a wicked act by my mother’s words. Why did she do it? Why did she lie to me?

‘I meant no harm, I just meant to bend Hester to my will,’ Mr Geraint said reasonably, as though no one could possibly blame him once they understood his motive. ‘I
loved you, Nell, and longed for you to be my child. Perhaps I even fooled myself into thinking that I really had fathered you. And I was trying to do good, only I had to – to manipulate Hester a little because she wouldn’t let me spend money on you, give you treats, take you out. She wanted you all to herself, she couldn’t bring herself to share. I never thought for one moment that she’d run off and take you away from me and Pengarth.’

‘She was my little girl,’ Hester said, her voice thin, reedy. ‘She was all I had … you never did understand, John, you never even tried. I was fond of Matthew, I was besotted by you, but I adored Nell. I would have done anything to keep her safe and by my side.’

‘I think we’ve talked enough,’ Nell put in. ‘It must be time for lunch. Snip will be in any moment and Matthew will be back soon.’ She turned to Mr Geraint. ‘Well? Who’s going to get Pengarth? Because if it’s one of your fancy women then I’ll burn the bloody place down sooner than see someone like that take over.’

Mr Geraint threw back his head and laughed until tears ran down his cheeks. Then he sobered. ‘Don’t worry, my fancy women wouldn’t thank me for Pengarth. It’ll go to someone who’ll value it, rest assured. And now let’s close the subject and have this lunch I was promised.’

Lunch was a silent meal and would have been worse had it not been for Snip. Mr Geraint decided to charm Snip and before the fascinated eyes of his ex-mistress and the girl he had already annoyed, he did just that.

He asked intelligent questions, listened with obvious interest to the answers, made sensible suggestions. He applauded most of the things they had done, but not all. He had not then seen round the castle itself but though he had never answered one of Nell’s letters it seemed he had read every word and taken everything in.

‘What happened to the idea of selling ice-creams
and tickets at the lodge?’ Mr Geraint asked at one point, after the meal was finished and the coffee cups were before them. ‘That seemed sensible to me, and it would have enabled you to take money from those who only wanted to visit the fairground and weren’t interested in a bit of culture.’

‘Ah, we thought of that, sir,’ Snip said, beaming, ‘but there was a big snag – can you guess what it was?’

‘Waste of manpower, having someone permanently in the lodge? I daresay you could have got over the fact that there’s no electricity there for a refrigerator.’

‘No, it was much simpler than that. Folk won’t pay for what they can’t see, that’s what we reckoned. And from the lodge you can’t really see the castle at all. If we can get them to come right up that long drive, they’ll not turn back without paying their money and seeing the lot. So we scrapped the idea of using the lodge, or even of having the hut farther down the drive.’

‘Then how does having the fair pay you?’

‘They give us ten per cent of their takings, in theory, but in practice it’s something for the kiddies rather than the adults. We didn’t really want the big attractions, so Gullivers sent us a junior scenic, a couple of gallopers and a few joints. What’s more, though some people might get cheated over the ten per cent, we’ve worked the fairs ourselves so we know more or less what they take and they hand it over all right. They wanted a concession for ices and candy floss, that sort of thing, but Nell said no, and though I was doubtful at the time I’m glad now. It wouldn’t help the restaurant if folk could buy cheaper on the fairground.’

‘You’ve worked the fairs? I knew nothing of this. Who’s going to enlighten me?’

Hester, who had preserved a stony silence throughout, gave Nell a quick, forbidding glare. The Snake Woman and Venom were to be kept a secret from Mr Geraint,
then. But Snip, having glanced at the women, realised that the onus of the conversation was going to be on him. Matthew, eating steadily, occasionally casting affectionate glances at Mr Geraint, was a man of few words at the best of times. When food was put before him, he could be described at best as single-minded, at worst as taciturn.

Snip therefore smiled at Mr Geraint and launched into his explanation. ‘Well, Nell and I first met when I was working the fairs with my father and it was only the war that stopped me working them for the rest of my life, I daresay. My Dad had a full scenic, dodgems and a junior scenic, or he did when I was living with him. After, I believe he branched out a bit. But anyway, take it from me that I know fairgrounds and that no one from Gullivers would cheat me.’

‘But you said “we worked the fairs”,’ Mr Geraint remarked; there was the faintest note of querulousness in his voice and Nell, glancing quickly across at him, saw that the day had already tired him and felt a pang of compunction. It really wasn’t all his fault, she told herself, clearing her throat. He told a lie but he had no idea what the consequences would be; we shouldn’t blame him entirely. Besides, he is an old, ill man.

‘I worked the fairs too, Mr Geraint,’ she said rather shyly. ‘I helped with a snake show for a time, then I was a conjuror’s assistant for a little, and whilst I was with Gullivers I looked after the joints sometimes. Oh, joints are the side-shows, the penny-rolls and hoop-las and darts and things.’

Hester sat up straight and looked steadily at Mr Geraint. ‘You’re very tired,’ she said. ‘I don’t think you’re well enough to get dragged round the castle. Go back to your hotel now and Matt will pick you up at whatever time you say tomorrow morning. And although it’s none of your business, when I left Pengarth I joined
the fair, and Nell and I travelled with them for a dozen years. It wasn’t an easy life, I came near to despair the first winter. So now you know as much as we do.’

He was staring at her with so much sadness in his expression that Nell jumped in once more, pity swamping her initial feeling that she and her mother had been used, had been mere pawns in his game.

‘We had a dreadful time the first winter right enough,’ she said, ‘but after that we loved it, didn’t we, Mum? We shared a trailer with a lady called Cissie and her daughter Fleur, ever so nice they were, and the trailer was warm and cosy and we had plenty of food. It wasn’t bad, really it wasn’t, Mr Geraint.’

He shook his head, still staring at Hester.

‘My fault, all my fault,’ he murmured. ‘But did you ever wonder what you’d left behind, Hester? Two broken men, that’s what you left. I started drinking, stopped caring about this place or any other place. Matt just existed, searching for you, longing for you. You and the child may have suffered, I’ve no doubt you did. If wishing could turn the clock back, I’d do it in a trice. But no matter how harsh your life was, I doubt you knew my mental anguish. Because I knew it was my fault.’

No one spoke. Nell could feel tears forming behind her eyes and blinked hard, determined not to let them fall. She looked down at the tablecloth as the tears inexorably rose, and heard her mother’s chair scrape back.

‘We none of us enjoyed what happened,’ Hester said harshly. ‘Come along, Mr Geraint, I’ll give you my arm back to the car. Matt, can you bring the car round to the arch?’

‘You could have cut the atmosphere with a knife,’ Snip said, when he and Nell were strolling back to the castle kitchen. ‘Anyone would have thought Hester really hated
the old man. And you weren’t very friendly at first, love, though you came round later.’

‘I think Mum has good reason to hate him,’ Nell said slowly. ‘He did her a great wrong, Snip. But somehow, though I suppose you could say what he did affected me too, all I could see was an ill old man who had been good to me once. And though he was wicked to tell Mum I was his child when he knew I was Matthew’s daughter, he did it to try to have some say in my life. In a way, he only wanted to help.’

‘Well, if it hadn’t been for him we wouldn’t have met,’ Snip observed as they crossed the courtyard and went into the kitchen. ‘So I’m glad he lied. Then he admitted you weren’t his child? He came right out with it?’

‘That’s right. He told Mum he’s known for some time that he couldn’t give anyone children. He had tests which proved he was sterile.’

‘Hmm. I wonder why he never answered your letters, then? Never took money from us when he could have done? It obviously wasn’t because he thought you were his kid!’

‘He didn’t want money when we wrote because he was already making a lot. And now I think it’s his health; when you’re as close as he is to death I don’t think money interests you all that much,’ Nell said shrewdly. ‘And he
is
close to death, Snip. He knows it and it doesn’t seem to worry him much.’

‘So he came here to sort out his affairs. Does that mean to decide what to do with Pengarth when he’s gone?’

‘I suppose so. I don’t know what he’s decided, he didn’t say. All he did say was that he wouldn’t leave it to one of his fancy women, that it would go to someone who valued it.’

‘Us,’ Snip said unhesitatingly. ‘Who else is there?’

‘Not us. Don’t get your hopes up, because Mr Geraint comes of a very big family and Mum was so nasty to him that I don’t think he would want to help us, anyway. But there’s Rosalie Clifton and her son Dan just for a start; if they came, I think we’d have to go.’

‘Why?’

‘We just would,’ Nell said. ‘But let’s not talk about it, not yet. He’ll be up here again tomorrow to look around. Perhaps he might give us a clue then.’

‘Right. Ah, here comes Hester,’ Snip said. He was standing at the sink, by the window which overlooked the courtyard. ‘I expect you’ll want to talk and I’ve got to polish the Long Gallery floor, so I’ll go and do that and leave you to gossip. Bring us a cuppa at four, there’s my girl.’

‘I’ll do that. And if Mum needs the kitchen for some of that fancy cooking she was talking about I’ll come up and give you a hand. Don’t forget the polish.’

‘As if I would.’

Snip collected all the paraphernalia he would need for waxing the parquet flooring and departed, whistling, just as Hester came in through the back door. Nell raised her brows.

‘Has Mr Geraint gone?’

‘Yes. I went in the car with them and Matt saw him right up to his room. Matt’s going to collect him at ten tomorrow morning. I said he could do the castle tour early, then have a good rest in the kitchen before taking a quick look at the outbuildings. That way, he might live to see Sussex again.’

Hester spoke without a flicker of feeling and Nell felt, for the first time, a slow burn of anger against her mother. She was being callous and hard to an old man who had done his best for Nell, albeit mistakenly. Suddenly she remembered that other lie, the one which had almost been forgotten in accusing Mr Geraint.

‘Mum, now that we’re alone I think you must tell me. Why did you lie to me about Dan? Make me think he was my brother? I’m not denying you truly thought Mr Geraint was my father, but you didn’t really think he was Dan’s, did you? So why say it? I think I’ve a right to know.’

‘He looked rather like you, you both had similar colouring,’ Hester said defensively. ‘It’s true I didn’t think you and Dan were brother and sister, but I thought you were related and I was sure the boy would be wrong for you. You must have realised how like Mr Geraint he was, both to look at and in his ways! Selfish, beautiful, thoughtless, a privileged member of a privileged class, that was Dan Clifton, and if you ask me you had a very lucky escape. Anyway, it’s all water under the bridge, isn’t it? You’re happy enough with Snip, you can’t deny it.’

‘A lucky escape? Who are you to decide my fate for me in such an arbitrary fashion?’ Nell was so angry and hurt that her voice became perilously close to a shout. ‘Snip and I are happy enough but that isn’t the same as being deeply in love! Snip was second best and you knew it. When I said I’d marry him it was because I wouldn’t have to explain to Dan that we were brother and sister! But Dan and I were very much in love and you tore us apart with no thought for what it would do to me. You talk about Mr Geraint wanting to have a say in what happened to me, but you wanted all of me, didn’t you? When I was first friendly with Snip you were horrid to him too. It was only when you realised that I wasn’t in love with him, never had been, that you withdrew all opposition to our being together. And Snip never had that … that
glow
which Dan had for me, he was just a nice fellow who needed me. If I’d known Dan and I were just some sort of cousins, I’d never have gone down to Southampton, let alone brought Snip back here!’

‘Well, it’s too late now,’ Hester said, her voice catching
on a sob. ‘Whatever I did I did because I loved you and wanted the best for you, sweetheart. You were someone special, I didn’t want you to be seduced by a practised charmer and then dumped, as I had been. Believe me, Dan wasn’t the man for you just as Mr Geraint wasn’t right for me. Look at the trouble Geraint caused, the pain and anguish, look how he tried to take you from me! Besides, Snip’s a nice fellow and fits in well with us here. He’s very like Matthew, steady and reliable, not the sort of chap to set the world on fire, but a strong shoulder to lean on when you’re in trouble.’