The Soldier's Daughter (34 page)

She was still there on her knees when Marion Frasier swept into the room in one of her ridiculous hats, saying, ‘Whatever is going on in here?’ And then as her eyes rested on her husband she pushed Briony aside and screamed, ‘Get out!
Get out
, I tell you!’

Badly shaken, Briony stumbled out onto the landing and somehow got back downstairs and into the kitchen. At last someone rapped on the front door and she flew along the hallway.

‘He – he’s upstairs in the bathroom,’ she stammered as Dr Restarick hurried past her. And then all she could do was wait.

Solemn-faced, he came into the kitchen some half an hour later and sadly shook his head, saying, ‘I’m so sorry, my dear, but he’s gone. There was nothing I could do. He was already dead when I arrived.’

‘What do you mean, he’s gone!’ Briony shouted incredulously. ‘How
can
he be gone? We had tea together earlier on and he was fine. He only went up for a bath!’

‘Your grandfather was a very poorly man,’ the doctor explained gently. ‘His heart was in danger of giving out at any time. I shall write “heart attack” as the cause of death on the death certificate.’

Every instinct that Briony had screamed at her that something wasn’t right here. The way Sebastian had come into the kitchen all smiles and friendly as could be when usually he didn’t have a civil word for her; the length of time he had left his father in the bath when normally it was over in a matter of minutes – but most of all the look on her grandfather’s face when she had found him. He had looked frightened!

‘But
surely
you’ll be doing a post-mortem?’ she said.

The doctor shook his head. ‘I don’t think there will be a need for that.’ He patted her shoulder kindly. ‘I’m sorry, Briony. I know what a difficult time this has been for you, what with Sarah taking ill and now this, but you have to try and be strong. Your grandmother is going to need you to help her get through this. She and William were very close. And I happen to know that he was very fond of you too, if that’s any consolation.’ He turned for the door then and all she could do was watch helplessly as he left. How could she voice her suspicions – and who would listen to her even if she did?

When the second telegram within days arrived at the little terraced house in Nuneaton, Lois stared at it fearfully. She was just having a cigarette in the kitchen with Mrs Brindley.

‘Shall I open it for yer, luvvie?’ Martha Brindley knew that Lois was already worried sick about Sarah and prayed that it wouldn’t contain bad news about the little girl. Lois had already lost her husband and if she were to lose her daughter too, it might tip her over the edge.

Lois handed the telegram over with shaking hands and lifting a knife from the table, Mrs Brindley slit it open and hastily read it.

‘It’s Sarah, isn’t it?’ Lois asked tremulously. ‘She’s died, hasn’t she?’

Mrs Brindley took a deep breath and shook her head. ‘No, it ain’t about Sarah, pet. It’s about yer dad. I’m afraid he’s passed away. Heart attack, it says here . . . I’m so sorry, but then didn’t you tell me some time ago how poorly ’e were?’

Lois nodded numbly. Part of her was relieved that it wasn’t Sarah, but another part of her cried out at the injustice of it all. Her father was gone and she had never had the chance to see him again after their long estrangement and tell him how much she loved him face to face. Bitterness towards her mother welled up inside her. They would never have been estranged in the first place if it hadn’t been for her, and she said as much now to Mrs Brindley as it all poured out of her.

‘Well, happen he knew,’ the woman said sensibly. ‘An’ there’s no use cryin’ over spilt milk now. It’s young Briony as I feel sorry for. She’s there in the thick of it.’

‘I know,’ Lois said dully. ‘And now I wonder if I did right sending them all there in the first place. If I hadn’t, Sarah wouldn’t have caught polio and my father might not have—’

‘You can stop that silly nonsense right now!’ Mrs Brindley said firmly. ‘It’s just one o’ them things.’

‘I wonder if I should telephone my mother,’ Lois said then. ‘Perhaps she’ll want me to attend the funeral.’

‘I can’t answer that. You must do what yer think is right.’

Lois pulled herself from the chair and walked unsteadily towards her coat which was hanging on a hook on the back of the door. This latest news had knocked her for six and her legs seemed to have developed a life of their own. After checking that she had enough coins for the call box, she told Mrs Brindley, ‘I shan’t be long. With a bit of luck it will be Briony that answers the phone.’

‘Shall I come with yer? You’ve ’ad a nasty shock,’ Mrs Brindley offered but Lois shook her head.

‘I’ll be fine, but I’d be grateful if you’d wait here till I get back. I don’t fancy being on my own at the minute.’

‘O’ course I will.’ Mrs Brindley’s eyes were full of sympathy as she watched Lois slip away. What was the saying? It never rains but it pours. Well, that was certainly the case here.

Lois was back within minutes, white-faced and shaking. ‘My brother answered the phone,’ she said tearfully. ‘And he took great pleasure in informing me that I wasn’t welcome there. Not even for my own father’s funeral! He wouldn’t even let me speak to Briony, not for a single moment.’ And then at last the dam broke and a torrent of tears flooded down her cheeks.

Mrs Brindley rubbed her arm tenderly. What a family! Poor Lois. For once even she was at a loss for words.

It was getting dark now but still Briony sat, numb with shock. Mr Page and Sebastian had removed her grandfather’s body to the funeral parlour earlier in the afternoon in one of the coffins that was stored in the barn, and since then there had been an endless stream of visitors. News travelled fast in such a small community and friends and neighbours were keen to offer their commiserations. It was clear that William Frasier had been a very respected and well-liked gentleman. Mr Page was going to prepare the body for burial, and had told her in hushed tones that she could visit her grandfather in the Chapel of Rest the following day if she so wished.

Once again, Mrs Dower and Howel had been marvellous and had come immediately they heard the news. Briony felt guilty just sitting there letting them do all the work, but Mrs Dower had insisted.

‘You just take it easy for a while,’ she said in a no-nonsense sort of voice. ‘You’ve had a bad shock, the second this week, and you need to rest.’

And so Briony did as she was told and stared unseeingly at Alfie and Mabel, who were arguing over a jigsaw puzzle.

It was as she was sitting there that an idea occurred to her and she asked, ‘Do you think Grandmother will send us away now that Grandfather has gone?’

Mrs Dower paused. She was rolling pastry for a rhubarb pie on the kitchen table. ‘I wouldn’t think so,’ she said eventually. ‘She knows how much you do about the house, and where else would she get anyone to do what you do for such a pittance?’

‘She’d be too worried about how it would look to her church cronies anyway,’ Howel butted in scathingly as he piled some more logs onto the fire.

‘You’re right there,’ his mother agreed. Sometimes when she saw the way Briony and the children were treated, she felt like asking them to all move in with her at Kynance Farm. But it wouldn’t do to be seen to be interfering so instead she made sure that she did everything she could to make it easy for them. She hadn’t been in the best of moods as it was today, even before the poor master had died. Howel had calmly informed her over breakfast that he had told Megan that he didn’t wish to see her any more.

‘But why not?’ she had gasped. ‘Megan’s a lovely, loyal girl and she thinks the world of you. A blind man on a galloping horse could see that from a distance!’

‘That was the problem,’ he had told his mother. ‘It wasn’t fair to leave her hoping that we’d be wed when I didn’t have the same feelings for her. She deserves better than that.’

‘Well, your loss will be another man’s gain, you mark my word, you silly young bugger,’ his mother had told him stroppily, but he had merely shrugged and carried on with his breakfast. As far as he was concerned it was done with, and the sooner his mother accepted the fact, the better. And now this, on top! Martha thought. First Sarah, then Howel’s bombshell – and now the poor master passing! It made her fearful of what else fate might have in store for them next!

William Frasier was buried a week later in the family plot in the little churchyard high on the hill overlooking the sea. It was a bitterly cold day with a nip of frost in the air, and the wind that whipped off the sea had the mourners holding onto their hats and shivering. Even so, Briony decided that it was a nice place to be buried. The quaint little church had been packed to capacity, with some folks even standing outside – and it reinforced to her yet again how highly her grandfather had been regarded. After a fierce row with her grandmother, the children had been left back at the house with Mrs Dower, who was preparing a spread for anyone that wished to return after the funeral. Briony had stood her ground on this one. She didn’t think that funerals were a place for children, and eventually Marion had backed down and grudgingly agreed that they needn’t attend. Briony was even allowed to sit in the front pew with Sebastian and her grandmother during the service, but she knew that it was only for show. It wouldn’t do to be banished to the back of the church, seeing as she was family.

She had heard a few people muttering about her mother’s absence, saying how disgraceful it was that Lois hadn’t bothered to show up for her own father’s funeral, even if they had been estranged for a number of years. Briony was forced to bite her tongue to stop herself from telling them the truth – that her mother
had not been allowed to come
. The day before, she had got up very early and had lifted an envelope from the mat in the hallway, written in her mother’s handwriting and addressed to Mrs M. Frasier. She had taken it straight in with the breakfast later, only to see the woman give it no more than a cursory glance, before throwing it into the heart of the flames that were licking up the chimney.

‘Huh! It’s from
her
!’ she had said with loathing, and clenching her hands into fists, Briony had slammed out, leaving her to it. Better that than give her a piece of her mind! The way Briony saw it, they could have been a comfort to each other at this sad time, but Marion was still determined to keep her at arm’s length. Briony thought it was stupid. They were both missing William, after all.

Now as the mourners all trailed out of the churchyard leaving the gravediggers to finish their job she walked sedately behind Sebastian and her grandmother. Marion was leaning heavily on his arm. The flimsy black veil that covered the woman’s hat was flapping madly in the breeze, but beneath it Briony could see that she was openly sobbing, which only went to show that she must have some feelings at least. Above them gulls and curlews were wheeling in the air and they could hear the crash of the waves on the beach beyond the cliff.

‘You will help to serve the food and drink to the mourners when we get back to the house, girl,’ her grandmother informed her coldly in the car on the way home.

During the previous week, Briony and Mrs Dower had methodically cleaned the whole of the downstairs. Dust sheets had been folded and put away, and the furniture and mirrors polished until they gleamed. Carpets had been taken outside and thrown across the line where they were beaten until there was not a spot of dust left on them, and even the library, which Briony had not even known was there, had been reopened. Sebastian had removed his father’s wheelchair, storing it in the garage, and the bed was once more upstairs in her grandparents’ bedroom, next to the room that Alfie now slept in. Howel had arrived early that morning to light fires in all the downstairs rooms, and as they entered the house they were met by warmth and the pleasant smell of cooking.

Mrs Dower had somehow managed to produce a banquet fit for a king even on rationing. There were hot meat pies and sausage rolls, bread – crusty and fresh from the oven – and a variety of cold meats and pickles as well as home-baked sponges and fruit cakes, and a number of other treats. It had been agreed that the children could attend the wake and they were waiting for Briony as she walked into the hallway, dry-eyed and looking terribly pale. Her grandmother instantly summoned Alfie to her and disappeared off into the sitting room with him, but Mabel sidled up to Briony and placed her small hand in hers.

‘Are yer all right?’ she asked softly with genuine affection, and this seemed to unlock the hard lump that had formed in Briony’s throat. She started to cry.

‘Come away into the kitchen,’ the little girl urged. ‘Yer don’t want this ’oity-toity lot seein’ yer blubbin’.’ She dragged Briony down the hallway, and as she entered the kitchen, Briony saw Howel standing there and just fell into his arms.

Mrs Dower, who was about to carry a plate of ham and mustard sandwiches through to the sitting room, felt something akin to an electric shock suddenly pass through her as she saw the tender way her son was cradling Briony in his arms.

So
that’s
why he got shot of young Megan, she thought to herself. He’s only gone and fallen for Briony! But the realisation brought her no joy. Briony already had a sweetheart and all she could see ahead was heartache for the silly young sod. Shaking her head, she hurried past them and got on with the job at hand.

Life gradually settled back into some sort of routine. The children had been allowed to return to school, which was just as well because the weather had turned so cold that they didn’t venture outside any more unless they had to, or unless they decided to go over to the farm to see Talwyn.

Sebastian seemed to be in a much better mood. Probably because now that his father was gone his mother was able to be a lot more generous with him, Mrs Dower said caustically.

‘He always was able to wrap her round his little finger,’ she confided to Briony. ‘And now the poor master’s gone, he’s probably bleeding her dry. But it’ll all end in tears, you just mark my words. The worm will turn one of these days – and it’ll be God help us all when it does and the money’s dried up!’