Hope. Part 45

A strangled sob came from Lady Harvey. Hope felt a slight sense of relief that Albert didn't appear to have revealed his relations.h.i.+p with Sir William, but she felt indignant that Rufus would blame her and Nell for his mother's wrongdoing.

'Have you forgotten we were servants?' she retorted. 'We would've been cast out if we'd uttered a word about it.'

He looked suddenly deflated and despairing. 'Yes, of course, that was unfair of me. I suppose I want to rage at my mother, as this was clearly what Albert held over her for years. But how can I rage at her? Just look at her!'

Hope turned. Lady Harvey looked so old, frail and vulnerable, with no trace left of the vivacious young woman who had captured the Captain's heart.

'Let it go,' Hope pleaded. 'Hasn't that dreadful man done enough damage to both our families? Don't let him do any more. Now, please take me home because I can't bear anything more. But we must get someone to come in with your mother because she shouldn't be alone after such a shock.'

'I'm not just his mother; I'm your mother too.'

Both Hope and Rufus wheeled round at Lady Harvey's strange statement.

She was sitting upright now, and although she was still crying she had a steadfast look about her.

'Don't be silly, Mother,' Rufus said, his tone softer as though he was speaking to a child. 'How can you be Hope's mother?'

'I am,' she insisted, looking up at them both. 'Hope is the result of my love for Angus. Nell and Bridie told me she was stillborn because of the scandal, and Nell took my baby home to Meg Renton.'

Hope and Rufus stood like statues, staring in silent astonishment at Lady Harvey. The wind was getting up outside, making a roaring sound in the chimney, and Betsy was making little gurgling sounds, but no one spoke or moved for some minutes.

Lady Harvey broke the silence. 'I know my mind wanders sometimes now, that I forget things and get mixed up. But this is the truth and you must believe me,' she said, her voice cracking with emotion. 'Hope is your half-sister, Rufus. If I'd known she had lived and where she was, maybe I could have found a way to bring you up together. But I didn't know who she was until the day Nell left Briargate; that's when she told me.'

Hope and Rufus stared at each other.

'But Nell believed Albert had killed Hope!' Rufus exclaimed. 'If you knew Hope was your daughter, why didn't you do something? Can you really have so little feeling?'

Hope put one hand on Rufus's arm to calm him. 'She was frightened of the scandal, I expect.'

'You know what your father was like back then,' Lady Harvey said defensively. 'I was scared, but I did tell him the truth eventually because Albert was blackmailing me. That's why he burned the place down, because we stood together and told him to leave.'

Rufus put his hands to his head again. 'So why didn't you tell me too?' he asked. 'I kept asking you both why you kept him on. I knew there was something. Surely you knew that I would help you, whatever you'd done?'

'I wish I had now, but we didn't want you upset or embarra.s.sed. I almost told you when we heard that Hope was out in the Crimea,' she said. 'But I couldn't find the words.'

'Does Angus know any of this?' Hope ventured. It was all too much for her. She knew it had to be true, for even a deranged old lady could hardly make up such a story. And clearly this was what lay behind Nell's reluctance for her to see Lady Harvey.

'No. He never knew.' The older woman began to cry again. 'Maybe Nell has told him since she went to work for him, but I doubt it as he would have come to see me and demanded to know why I kept it from him.'

Rufus looked as if he'd seen a ghost. His face was white and his eyes were wide and startled.

Much as Hope wished to give him comfort, his mother needed it more for she was shaking and distraught, so she went to her, drew her head to her chest and patted her back comfortingly. 'I don't know what to say to you,' she said softly. 'I need to think about it all and hear it from Nell too.'

'Do you believe me?' The older woman drew back from Hope's arms and looked up at her.

'Yes,' Hope nodded. 'But right now I can't deal with it. I need to get Betsy home.'

'I don't want you getting anyone to come in here,' Lady Harvey whimpered. 'I couldn't talk to anyone, I'd rather be alone.'

Hope didn't speak as the buggy bowled along the road. The clip-clop of Flash's hooves and the whizzing of the wheels seemed entirely at one with her thoughts as she pinpointed little incidents that gave credence to her real parentage.

Nell's nervousness about Angus when he came to Briar-gate, the feelings she'd so often had of not entirely belonging in her family, even that old tale about her being 'a fairy child' had new meaning now. There was the bond between her and Rufus, and one with Angus too. She certainly couldn't be ashamed or sorry she was related to either of them.

But it was the knowledge that Nell wasn't her true sister that hurt. She'd been everything to her, often more of a mother than an older sister. It was devastating to know there was no blood tie between them and that Nell had kept this secret for all these years.

Where Lady Harvey was concerned she felt nothing, for there was little to admire the woman for. Meg Renton was a far more admirable person, for she'd brought Hope up and loved her as if she were her own.

She glanced at Rufus. It was dark now but she could see his profile well enough to see his mouth was tight, and that he was struggling to come to terms with the shattering events of the day.

'What a day, eh!' she said and slipped one hand over his on the horse's reins.

'At least I gained a sister,' he sighed. 'I always had a special regard for you, but I could never have suspected this. We are so completely different! There isn't one similarity. Me blond, you dark, one with blue eyes, one with brown, how can it be?'

'You had two blond-haired, blue-eyed parents,' Hope said. 'Clearly I inherited everything from Angus. Imagine if I had been like you. Questions would've been asked! In the village they talk about people being "as dark as a Renton".'

'I have to say that if one has to hear one's mother had a secret love child, I'm glad it was you,' he said, but his voice cracked with emotion as if he was struggling not to cry.

'Try not to be angry with your mother,' she said soothingly. 'It must have been terrible for her. None of us know what we'd do in such circ.u.mstances.'

'I always knew there was something lurking in the past,' Rufus said thoughtfully. 'But I thought it was to do with my father.'

'She did love him,' Hope ventured.

'But he couldn't love her, could he?' Rufus said.

Hope's heart skipped a beat, for that sounded very much as if Rufus knew about his father's nature too. As she didn't know howto reply she stayed silent.

'He loved other men,' Rufus blurted out. 'That was the problem between them.'

The sound of the wheels and the horse's hooves seemed to growlouder and louder as Hope racked her brain for the right response.

'Your silence tells me you already knew this,' he said. 'And I can guess at what point you found out too. I remained in ignorance until after Briargate was burned down. I went down to Wells because I thought someone at the Bishop's Palace might know something about Albert. Someone did, and he told me what Albert was.'

Rufus held the reins with his right hand and with his left caught hold of Hope's chin and tilted it so he could look at her. 'I'd had little suspicions about Father long before that. You learn about such things at boarding school, you see, and at Oxford I met men who were that way. But when I knew about Albert it all fell into place. My parents' fear of him, the missing money, the way he strutted around Briargate and, of course, your disappearance.'

He let go of her chin and took her hand. 'I'm sorry,' he sighed. 'Maybe I should have kept all that to myself the way you have. On our first meeting after you returned here, I noted how you said nothing about my father, other than the usual polite condolence. That was all the confirmation I needed that my guesswork was correct. But I'll wager you wouldn't ever have told me?'

'No, I wouldn't,' she said in a small voice. 'I wish to G.o.d you didn't know.' She leaned her head against his shoulder, feeling such sadness and sympathy for him.

'I'm not going to ask you for any details,' he said in a choked voice. 'I want to put it aside, and start anew.'

Hope nodded against his shoulder.

'I won't come in with you tonight either,' he went on. 'I must get to the police and back to Mother. But in a day or two I'll come and talk to Nell. Did she know about Albert and my father?'

'No, and please don't tell her,' Hope said. 'She's suffered enough at that man's hands.'

'I won't speak of it again to anyone,' he said, glancing round at her. 'It was in the past, it doesn't matter any more.'

As soon as Nell opened the front door to Hope, she sensed the day had not been a good one for her sister's eyes looked heavy and she was very pale and drawn. 'Why didn't Rufus come in?' she asked, taking the sleeping baby from her sister's arms. 'I hope you haven't fallen out?'

'No, Nell. He just needed to get back to Lady Harvey,' Hope said. 'Would you put Betsy up in her crib for me?'

Nell hurriedly did as she was asked, and when she came back downstairs Hope had gone into the kitchen and was standing by the stove warming her hands.

'Let me take your cloak and hat,' Nell said. 'Then I'll make you a hot toddy, you look frozen.'

As Hope removed her cloak Nell sawthe stains down her dress. 'What on earth is that?'

'Blood,' Hope blurted out. 'Albert's blood. I killed him.'

Nell clapped her hands over her mouth. 'Albert? He came to Briargate?' she exclaimed. She thought she'd misunderstood what Hope said.

'Yes, Nell, of course he did,' Hope said somewhat impatiently. 'I just said, I killed him. I was in the stables when he came in. I killed him with a pitchfork.'

Nell felt as if all the blood had suddenly left her body. Over the years she'd often pondered what her reaction would be if Albert was caught and hanged for his crimes. She knew she wouldn't like the renewed gossip it would bring, but she'd always felt that it would be like a weight off her shoulders to know he'd gone for good.

But Hope standing there with his blood on her dress, calmly telling her she'd killed him with a pitchfork, wasn't a situation she could ever have prepared herself for.

'Oh, my Lord,' she exclaimed, and suddenly she was crying as though she would never stop.

'I'm sorry I told you so bluntly,' she heard Hope saying above the sound of her own sobbing. 'I didn't think you'd be so upset.'

'I'm not upset that he's dead,' Nell managed to get out. 'If I'd heard he drowned, died of a disease, or was even shot by a gamekeeper I would have rejoiced. It's the thought that he came near you again. That once again he has hurt those I love.'

Hope made some tea and sat down with Nell, explaining exactly what had happened. But as Nell began to pull herself together she realized that retelling it had brought all the horror back for her sister for she was shaking and crying.

'You're a brave girl and no mistake,' she said, enveloping Hope in her arms. 'You should never have had to see that beast again; he did enough to you in the past. I had a bad feeling this morning about you going up to Briargate; I didn't want you to go. Thank G.o.d you and Betsy are safe, I couldn't live without you two.'

She made Hope a hot toddy, and insisted that she must go to bed because she was all in. 'We'll talk some more about it tomorrow,' she said as she helped Hope out of her clothes and slipped a warm nightgown over her head. 'When Betsy wakes I'll change her and bring her to you for her feed, but you must stay in bed.'

After she'd tucked Hope into bed, Nell went back downstairs and sat by the stove. She felt chilled to the marrow and sick at heart.

She should never have agreed to marry Albert; in her heart she'd always known it wasn't right. He was a strange fish, everyone always said that. And here she was at thirty-nine, free of him at last, but too old now for any man to want.

Tears ran down her face. She was crying for the girl inside her who had never experienced real love and been cheated of a family of her own. When she looked back, her life had been nothing but hard work with so little joy.

But her tears were for Hope too. They said she was a fairy child, and yet she'd had the hardest life of all. And Nell loved her so much that Hope's pain was hers too.

Hope pretended to fall asleep again when Nell took Betsy from her arms after her night feed, but she was watching Nell from beneath her eyelashes.

Everything about her was neat. Her hair was always clean, s.h.i.+ny and pinned up with never a stray lock escaping, her collars and cuffs were always crisp and white, she kept an ap.r.o.n on for most of the day but it was never dirty. Her boots were polished, her nails neatly trimmed, even her face looked as if it had just been scrubbed. She moved so neatly too, and was never clumsy or noisy. She often described herself as plain, but in fact there was beauty in her simplicity, or maybe it was her honesty and integrity which shone through, making her so special.

Hope hadn't felt able to tell her what Lady Harvey had revealed Albert's death was enough for one day. A secret that had been kept for nearly twenty-four years could wait another day.

As she watched Nell tenderly rocking Betsy in her arms she thought how astounding it was that a sixteen-year-old girl could have entered into a pact with an older maid just to protect her mistress from scandal and ruin. What selflessness that had taken, such loyalty and love! And that devotion had never faltered; not to Lady Harvey, nor to her. Hope had felt Nell's love for her right from when she had been a small child. Albert had done his best to snuff it out, but it had been too strong for that.

Yet even more astounding was that when Lady Harvey failed to support her, Nell didn't retaliate in any way, not even telling Angus that he had a child. She was a very remarkable woman in every way.

'I love you, Nell,' she whispered to herself. 'Blood-sister or not, I am the lucky one to have you.'

It wasn't until the evening of the following day that Hope finally managed to get Nell on her own to tell her what she knew.

Dora had been bustling around cleaning in the early part of the morning. Then a police sergeant had called to question Hope about Albert's death. Fortunately he had taken part in the manhunt for Albert following the fire at Briargate, so agreed that Hope must have acted in self-defence and congratulated her on her bravery. He'd no sooner gone than a neighbour called, and after that Betsy kept crying and it just wasn't possible to have a serious conversation while Nell was flapping around making the supper.

But once the supper things were washed up, Betsy bathed and asleep in her crib, and they were finally sitting beside the fire in the parlour, Hope told Nell how Lady Harvey had revealed she was her mother.

Nell turned very pale, and she looked frightened too.

'I'm not angry, I'm not sitting in judgment on either you or Lady Harvey,' Hope a.s.sured her. 'I just want to understand how it all came about. So please tell me the whole story, right from the start.'

Nell spilled it out in fits and starts, stammering with nervousness at some points, at others showing indignation that at only sixteen she was forced to be party to something she knew to be very wrong.

'It never crossed my mind that she could be carrying a child,' she said as she explained how Lady Harvey had stayed up in her room for several weeks. 'It was only when the other servants had gone to London, and Bridie and I were alone in the house with her, that Bridie told me.'

It was clear to Hope that Nell had relived that scene up in her mistress's bedroom many, many times over the years for she described it all in great detail once she got going. As she related how she was taking what she thought was a dead baby down the backstairs and it moved, she began to cry.

'I knew Bridie didn't want it to live, but once I looked at you and sawyour little hands moving, I was done for,' she said.

Hope winced at the part where Nell caught Bridie about to smother her. 'Don't judge her!' Nell exclaimed. 'She was frightened, she loved Lady Harvey and she couldn't bear what would happen if this got out. That's when I thought of taking you home to Mother.'

'And she took me, just like that?' Hope asked in astonishment as Nell described how Meg took her in her arms and fed her.

'She loved babies,' Nell said. 'And she couldn't bear to think of what would happen to you if she refused. She told me some time later that Father was angry the next morning to find she'd agreed. He went off to work grumbling and complaining about how little they'd already got without another mouth to feed. But that night he came home and picked you up and kissed you. He never said another word about it.'

Hope could remember sitting on her father's knee, how he used to tell her stories and sing to her. She hadn't once felt inferior to the older children, if anything she received more love and affection than any of them.

'Wasn't anyone suspicious?' she asked. 'What about Matt, James and Ruth? Surely they were old enough to know Mother hadn't given birth to me?'

'When there's already ten children and they've grown used to another one arriving every couple of years, they don't think beyond whether that means they'd have to help feed and change it,' Nell said with a wry smile. 'Matt did say once after his first was born that he didn't know how Mother managed to stay so quiet having you, because Amy screamed the place down. But he wasn't suspicious, he didn't remember Mother making any fuss having any of the younger ones.'

'What was Lady Harvey like after the birth?'

'Very sad and weepy she was. But soon after she went up to London to join Sir William, and I stayed at Briargate. She was gone for three months, and I was glad about that because I could go home most afternoons and see you. You were the prettiest baby I've ever seen.'

'Oh, Nell,' Hope sighed. 'That was such a big burden for you!'

'You were never a burden,' Nell said looking fondly at Hope. 'I suppose I was at that age when some girls become mothers themselves. I was scared stiff though that day I took you up to Briargate and you ran into the Captain. Do you remember that?'

Hope nodded. 'You knew he was my father even then?'

'No! That was the day I realized. I just took one look at his face and sawyou in it. Bridie was dead by then; there was no one I could ask. But I knew. I wonder you haven't noticed it too.'

'I didn't have any reason to be looking for such things,' Hope said. 'But will we tell him now?'

'Well, of course you can.' Nell smiled then, as if suddenly she had something to feel good about. 'He'll be father and grandfather all at once, won't he?'

'I sort of felt something with Angus almost from the first time I met him,' Hope said pensively. 'But it didn't work that way with Lady Harvey. Why do you think that was?'