Wideacre twt-1 Read online

  Celia, overwrought and anxious, gave a little sob and buried her face in the silk of my skirt. I rested one gentle hand on her bowed head. Poor Celia! She understood so little, and she tried to do so much.

  I stroked her hair soothingly. It was soft as warm silk to the touch.

  ‘Silly Celia,’ I said lovingly. ‘And what a scene you made of it yesterday!’

  She turned her face into my lap and then looked up at me smiling.

  ‘I don’t know what I was thinking of,’ she confessed. ‘Something in my head just broke and I was so angry I did not know what I was saying or doing. I have been so worried for John, and so afraid about what was happening. Nobody seemed to be like themselves any more: you, Harry, John of course. It all seemed so different, so strange, when, before, we were all so happy. There seemed to be something poisoning the whole house.’

  My smile hid my sudden shock. I had heard this before. Celia was talking just as Mama had done. They both had a sense of the corruption between Harry and me. It was as if our sin were some rotting thing in the house that stank until anyone close to us could smell it, but not know what it was. I gave a little shudder at the thought and bent down to bury my own face in Celia’s sweet-smelling hair.

  ‘Let us talk no more tonight,’ I said. ‘In the morning I shall show you a letter I have had from a Dr Rose at Bristol, and if you agree he sounds like the very person for John then we can send for him to come and see John here.’

  Celia got obediently to her feet. She looked tremendously relieved. I had stripped her of her power by using my wits and by exploiting her own trusting nature. She was free again to be the loving wife and the pet of the household. She went lightly to the door and whispered, ‘Goodnight, God bless you,’ and then left me. I smiled at the embers of the logs and sat before the fire with my feet on the fender. Celia had caused me some alarm, but I had her back in my hand now. I rang the bell for my maid, Lucy.

  ‘Fetch me a glass of port from the hamper that was delivered from Chichester, please,’ I said to her. ‘And take the bottle into Mr MacAndrew’s bedroom.’

  Afterwards I wanned my toes, and sipped my glass until I was called to supper. I read in the parlour until the clocks chimed midnight and, at the witching hour, I went to my bed and slept.

  * * *

  It was a busy week for me. I replied to Dr Rose and asked him and his partner to come and see John, and, if they thought him likely to respond to treatment, to take him back in their carriage. Left to me, John could have gone into a public hospital for the insane where the lunatics wallowed in their own filth and jabbered like monkeys in corners. But Dr Rose’s place was quite different. He had a small manor house outside Bristol and took only half-a-dozen patients. His method was slowly to reduce their alcohol, or drugs, until they were able to face the day with only very small amounts. In some cases they learned to do without their laundanum, opium or alcohol altogether, and could return to their friends and families completely cured.

  As soon as that letter had gone off I received one from the London lawyers, who were ready to take steps to buy the entail if I thought the capital to compensate Charles Lacey would be forthcoming. My married name, MacAndrew, inspired a good deal of respect in the City and the letter was positively servile. But they would not be doing their job if they had not cautioned me that the cost of buying the entail was likely to be as much as £200,000. I nibbled the end of my pen and smiled at that. A week ago and I would have been in despair, but now, I thought, with sweet Celia’s help, I might be able to find that sum within the month. So I wrote them a guarded reply and told them to open negotiations with Charles and to keep the price as low as possible.

  The second letter I had was from a London merchant who had been approached by our solicitors about a possible mortgage to raise the capital we would need to pay the legal fees. The MacAndrew fortune would stretch only so far, and we would have to mortgage some of Wideacre’s lovely land to take the whole of the estate for my son. If the figures I had calculated were right, I should be able to pay off the mortgage before Richard was even twenty-one. With extra corn grown on the common, extra rents paid, and bad debts called in, Wideacre could nearly double its profits. But it would be a hard winter for the people if we did all that. The merchant, Mr Llewellyn, offered to drive down to Wideacre to see the land for himself, and I sent him a civil invitation to come within the week.

  And then I tired of my office and the four walls around me and slipped upstairs to Richard’s nursery where he was in the middle of his breakfast.

  There is nothing, nothing in the world messier than a young child learning to feed himself. And, providing you do not have to touch him yourself, no sight more endearing. Richard grabbed unsteadily at his cup of milk and splashed at his face, getting some, accidentally I think, in his mouth. His little fist closed on a slice of bread and butter and he ate from his own hand like a little savage. His buttery, milky, stained face beamed at me through a mask of food and I beamed back.

  ‘Isn’t he growing!’ I said to Nurse.

  ‘Indeed, yes,’ she said, hovering with a wet cloth waiting for Richard to conclude this feast of the senses. ‘And so strong and so clever too!’

  ‘Dress him warmly,’ I said. ‘I shall take him out driving in the new trap I bought. You will come too.’

  ‘There!’ she said to Richard approvingly. ‘Won’t that be a treat!’

  She wiped him clean and lifted him from the chair to take him through’ to his bedroom. I heard his protesting wails as she stripped and cleaned him, and I stood, idle, by the nursery fire smiling at the noise. He has a good pair of lungs, my son Richard, and a will as strong as my own. When they came out together he was dressed as I had ordered, but his hapless nurse looked ruffled and cross.

  ‘Mama!’ he said, and scrambled across the room in a little rolling crawl to my feet. My skirts billowed as I plumped down beside him on the floor and lifted him to my face. His gentle little hand patted my cheek and his deep blue eyes were fixed on mine with the unswerving love that only very small well-loved children give. I buried my face in his neck and kissed him hard, and then I play-bit his little bulging tummy, so full of bread and milk, and tickled his warm well-covered ribs until he gurgled and whooped for mercy.

  While Nurse found her bonnet and shawl and an extra blanket for him, I romped and played with him like a child myself. I hid behind the armchair and popped out at him to his uproarious delight. I hid his moppet behind me and let him find her. I tumbled him over and rolled him on the floor, then I tossed him up to the ceiling and pretended to drop him in a great giggly swoop down to the floor.

  Then I caught him up to me and carried him down the west-wing stairs out through the side entrance to the stable yard. John was just coming in and he froze to see me, my child on my hip, my face flushed with love and laughter. I handed Richard to Nurse, who took him on out to see the horses.

  ‘Thank you for your present of last night,’ said John. His face was sickly white. He looked as if he had drunk deep.

  ‘You are welcome,’ I said icily. ‘You can be sure that I will always keep you supplied with whatever you need.’

  His mouth trembled. ‘Beatrice, for pity’s sake don’t…’ he said. ‘It is an awful thing to do to a man. I have seen better men than I end up as puking puppies in the street through drinking continually to excess. Celia thinks she can cure me; she says you all three agreed there should be no drink left in the house. Please don’t send me bottles like that.’

  I shrugged. ‘If you do not want them, don’t drink them,’ I said. ‘I cannot make the whole of Sussex dry for you. There will always be drink around, perhaps one or another servant will always bring you a glass. I cannot help that.’

  ‘You can help it, Beatrice, for you order it,’ he said with an invalid’s sudden nervous energy. ‘Your word is the law at Wideacre. If you had a mind to save me you could ban drink from the whole estate and no one would disobey you.’

  I smiled slowly i