Page 7 of Loyalty (The Chaplain’s Legacy #5)

K atherine found there was a subtle change in the house after Mrs Vance’s visit. Nothing was said openly, at least not by Aunt Cathcart, and Aveline’s hostility still smouldered, but there was some shift in the air. It was hard to pin down, but was definitely there.

The first tangible sign was when Aunt Cathcart took Katherine to Helmsley to be fitted for a new riding habit. She had brought two with her, but they were not fashionable enough for Aunt Cathcart.

“All this walking about is all very well, but for proper exercise you need to ride more,” she told Katherine as the carriage brought them home. “There is a very docile mare in the stables that the girls no longer need, so you can have exclusive use of that.”

“Thank you, aunt. I should like that very much, if you can spare me now and then.”

Her aunt smiled and patted her gloved hand. “Well, now, Katherine, I believe I can. It seems to me that you are not at all comfortable with the formality of our life here — the morning calls and so forth, and perhaps I have been too hard on you, expecting you to join in everything, just as Aveline does. You need a little more time to accustom yourself to our ways. So from now on, you may choose whether to make or receive calls, and if you prefer not to, why then you may ride on those afternoons, and no one will think anything of it. We may tell our friends that it is for your health, for we would not want anyone to imagine that we have quarrelled, or anything of that nature.”

“No, indeed, aunt!”

“Besides, who knows who you might meet if you are out and about,” she added, with a sly smile. “If you go out at two o’clock, you will have time to ride for a couple of hours, and leave yourself plenty of time to dress for dinner. You can take Marlowe with you. He knows all the routes safe for a lady.”

“Very well, aunt,” Katherine said. This was better! She would be up on the hills in the clean, fresh air instead of trying to hide in a corner of the drawing room, or, even worse, attempting to make conversation. Two or three times a week she would have two hours entirely to herself, to think her own thoughts and not have to pretend that she belonged in this strange, rigid society, where every day brought new challenges and the possibility of some misstep that would bring censure down on her head. Her aunt was very kind, but Katherine was still terrified of putting a foot wrong.

And she could think happier thoughts, too, like remembering the glorious day when Mr Kent Atherton had spent half an hour with her in the parlour, unwrapping her music cabinet and talking in the most civil manner to Mrs Vance, which was more than Aunt Cathcart could bring herself to do.

Sadly, the docile mare was exactly as described, so there was no possibility of getting up a turn of speed. Nor could she wander where she wanted, for Aunt Cathcart gave the groom strict instructions for each outing, which seemed to be limited to the two villages of Birchall and Corland, and their immediate environs.

The second change was entirely accidental. She had gone to the rectory to sew one afternoon, and ended with a visit to the church to pray for a while. There was someone there already, a young girl in homespun clothing weeping piteously at the Lady Chapel altar rail.

“Oh, my dear, whatever is the matter?” Katherine said gently, kneeling beside her. “Is life so troublesome just now?”

“Oh! Oh, no, I’m very lucky, miss… I live with me uncle now, and he’s very kind to me.” With a convulsive sob, she wiped her face with her sleeve, a rather grubby sleeve, it had to be said.

“I know what that is like,” Katherine said, with a little smile. “I live with my uncle too, and he is also very kind. But it is not like one’s own family, is it? Are your parents dead?”

“Oh, no, miss! Me pa’s a farmer out Welwood way, but… it were best for me to come away, and me uncle said I could stay wi’ him for a while. Just until… well, when everything’s quietened down a bit.”

Katherine pondered this artless but rather baffling information, not liking to pry too much into the ‘everything’ that needed to quieten down before the girl could return home.

“Y’see, miss, I did a bad thing,” the girl went on.

“Oh, so your conscience is troubling you?” Katherine said. That, too, she could understand. One tried very hard to be good and avoid evil thoughts, but sometimes she could not quite suppress her resentment. Those times when Aveline had been particularly cutting or Aunt Cathcart made it very clear that Katherine’s father was an embarrassment or even when Jenny was kept so long by Susan and Lucinda that there was barely time for Katherine to scramble into her evening gown before dinner. Trivial incidents, but they rankled just the same.

The girl raised her tear-stained face, looking rather puzzled. “Well… I suppose. Just need to keep out of the way, because if I’m asked… not sure what to say. I mean, he told me what to say, and I did it right enough, but… well, if I’m asked again, I might not say the right thing, see?”

Katherine was not entirely sure she did see. Tentatively, she said, “So, was it a lie, what you were told to say?”

The girl nodded.

“The best way to assuage your conscience over a lie is to tell the truth,” Katherine said firmly.

The girl blanched. “Ooh, miss, I couldn’t do that! It would upset him to no end, that it would. No, all I’m s’posed to do is keep out of the way, like, in case… well, just in case. That’s why I’m here but me uncle’s a clerk with an attorney, so there’s not much for me to do. I wish I could go home. At least I’d be busy there.”

“There would be plenty of work in Birchall for you, if you want it, surely?”

“Who’d take me on, miss?” she said, giggling.

“Can you press a gown? Brush mud from a coat? Arrange hair?”

“Oooh, I love doin’ hair, miss!”

“Then you can be my lady’s maid… what is your name?”

“Daisy, miss. Daisy Marler.”

“Well, Daisy, you can be busy at Cathcart House, and if you have a quiet moment to yourself, you can ponder the wisdom of telling lies, the damage to your immortal soul thereby and how much better you will feel if you unburden yourself by telling the truth.”

Daisy looked at her doubtfully. “Um… yes, miss.”

It was not to be supposed that Aunt Cathcart would accept this change in her household without protest.

“Is Jenny not giving satisfaction, Katherine?” she said frowning.

“Of course, but she has enough to do attending to Susan and Lucinda. A third person added to her duties is something of a stretch, so I have often been later than I should wish going downstairs. I know how Uncle Cathcart likes his dinner on time, and it mortifies me to be the means of delaying the meal. This way will not inconvenience anyone, and Susan and Lucinda will not have to share Jenny with me.” Then, when her aunt still looked dubious, she added, “I should pay her wages myself, naturally.”

“There is still her board to take into account.”

“She may live out, if you prefer. She lives with her uncle at present.”

“Who is her uncle?”

“Roger Bright, clerk to Mr Whistley.”

“Her name?”

“Daisy Marler. Her father is a farmer at Welwood.”

“I know of Marler, of course. A respectable family, by all I hear. Very well. She may live in. A lady’s maid must live in, Katherine, so that she is always on hand when needed, even when you return from a ball at four in the morning.”

On the whole, Katherine felt she was better off than before. She was no longer dragged along reluctantly to social events, she had her afternoons of riding, and she had her own lady’s maid again. Not that Daisy was particularly competent, but she was very willing and eager to learn, and Katherine’s needs were not great. So long as her gowns were clean and pressed when she needed them, she asked nothing more, being quite happy to mend tears and make adjustments herself, and her hair was always simply dressed.

But her greatest joy was riding again, despite her sluggish mount. Within a few days, Emily had learnt of her outings and her easy-going parents had agreed that she might ride with Katherine whenever she wished. The two ambled along side by side, chattering away, the two grooms trailing behind, also talking. Sometimes, Emily’s brother Lucas rode with them, too, although since his horse and Emily’s were much faster than Katherine’s, they tended to ride ahead at speed, and then wait for her to catch them up.

The best day, however, was the one when they encountered Mr Kent Atherton also out riding, and he stopped to chat. Then, glory of glories, he wheeled about and rode with them, not riding fast with Mr Lucas and Emily, but walking his horse at Katherine’s slow pace and chatting companionably to her. As if she were someone worthy of his attention. As if they were friends!

Katherine returned home with her head in the clouds, unable to suppress a smile of pure happiness.

***

K ent was restless. The description of Branton as a forward looking town, without further elaboration, had led him to look it up in various itineraries, which had described it as a ‘thriving manufacturing town, with much production of cotton, linen and worsted. The population has grown rapidly in recent years, leading to the provision of numerous fine public buildings and a handsome new church. It has the privilege of markets on Wednesdays and Saturdays.’ All of which could describe a hundred undistinguished northern towns.

If only he could see it! He knew so little of these industrious northern towns, churning out woollens and cottons, spoons and buckets, nails and glass and who knew what else. His experience was limited to London, York and Cambridge, a few coastal or small market towns, and the country estates of his friends and relatives. Other towns were passed through as quickly as a change of horses or an overnight stop allowed. What a dull life he had led!

One evening, when he and his father were the only men lingering over the port, he mentioned again his wish to learn more of engines.

The earl had shaken his head tiredly. “A gentleman does not deal in such matters, Kent.”

“I should not be dealing in engines, Father. I merely wish to understand how they work. If it is a question of money, my allowance would be enough for lodgings in Birmingham, I am sure, and—”

His father sighed heavily. “You are bored, I dare say. There is little enough for a young man to do here. You would be more settled if you had a wife. You are what, twenty-two now? I was not much older than that when I married your mother.” He paused, one hand rubbing his eyes. “I wish she had not gone away,” he went on querulously. “She knows I cannot manage without her. The place feels so empty now, with Nicholson gone, Alice keeping to her room, Walter gone off to do heaven knows what and Eustace never here. Thank God for you and Olivia, that is all I say. Without the two of you, I should run mad, I swear it. A wife, that is what you need, Kent. Every man needs a wife to keep him straight and give his life purpose. Find yourself a little woman to marry and bring her here to live. That would liven us all up, would it not? A woman about the place, and grandchildren to enjoy — that is what we need here.”

Kent gave it up. His father was not himself at present, with Mother gone away now that their marriage was invalid, and urging the earl to marry again and have more sons to inherit. No son who cared about his father could abandon him at such a moment. The engines must perforce wait a little longer.

Perhaps he could write to the foundry at Birmingham to ask their advice about reading materials to help him learn the principles behind beam engines? Steam power had so many possibilities, but he had only picked up snippets of information from the newspapers or gossip amongst the gentlemen who invested in the new mills or in mines where engines were employed to pump out water. There was so much more to learn!

He was riding the next day, mentally composing a letter to be sent to Birmingham, when he came across a little group of other riders — his cousins Lucas and Emily, and the blushing Miss Parish, whose face lit up with a smile of such brilliance as he approached that he could not resist turning his horse about to join them. And there was another motive, too, for perhaps in the less formal setting of a ride on the hills, Miss Parish would feel sufficiently at ease to talk to him freely. He could learn something of the manufacturing town of Branton, and also something of Miss Parish, too.

So when the track opened up and Lucas and Emily raced each other to a distant tree, he settled beside Miss Parish’s slower mount.

“Does she ever move beyond a walking pace?” he asked, pointing to her horse with a wry grimace.

“Only when she nears home and the prospect of oats.”

“How dull that must be!”

“I do not mind. It is pleasure enough to be out on the hills.”

She still blushed whenever she spoke, but she was a great deal more articulate than usual.

“Did you ride a great deal at Branton?”

“Perhaps once or twice a week.”

“Where did you go to? Along the rivers, through the fields or up onto the hills? Are there hills around Branton?” he added, realising he had no idea how the town was situated.

She gave a little laugh. “There are! And that is where I mostly rode. I loved to look down on the town from above, to watch the carriages and wagons coming and going, the chimneys smoking and people scurrying about like little ants, busy on business of their own.”

They were above Birchall, looking down past Westwick Heights, where Emily and Lucas lived. Cathcart House was hidden in the trees, but most of the village was visible and in the distance to the north, the roof of Corland Castle could just be perceived.

“A little different from this view, I suppose, although we have our share of smoking chimneys, too.”

“Oh no,” she said seriously. “Branton has proper chimneys… big ones. Very tall, belching out clouds of smoke. Sometimes, when the wind was in the wrong direction, the whole town was hidden by the smoke, like a great, dark blanket covering everything.”

“Ah, steam-powered engines?” She nodded. “What are they used for? Pumping… or manufacturing?”

“Both.”

“How fascinating!” he cried. “I should love to see your town, Miss Parish.”

She turned astonished eyes on him. “Truly? But why? It is a very ordinary town.”

“Not to me, Miss Parish. Not to me. A town full of mills? And boasting beam engines and all manner of delights? Yes, I should love to see it, to examine all those beam engines and watch them in action, for I must tell you that I have read about them, and heard them described in the minutest detail, but I cannot picture it in my mind’s eye. I cannot understand how it all works — the pistons and valves and condensers and rods, the coal and water and steam. You see, I have all the terms at my fingertips, but I cannot see it. I need to see all the moving parts to truly understand it.”

“Oh yes!” she said, smiling at him in a way that melted him inside in the most peculiar way. “To see one moving… yes, that is something indeed. But it is the noise that awes me most… the tremendous sound of such massive machinery, everything rising and falling, or turning, turning, great metal rods in constant motion and such sounds! The very ground shakes beneath one’s feet. And the smell of smoke and the hissing of steam and— oh, such engines are magnificent, Mr Atherton, and my father’s was the largest and most magnificent of all.”

“Your father… he had a beam engine? A mill?”

“He did, and if he had lived for the three years he estimated it would take to pay back the loans and begin to make a profit, we should have been rich, and I should not be living in my uncle’s house as the poor relation. But pray do not mention this to anyone, for Aunt Cathcart is ashamed of my father’s occupation.”

“But you are not?” he said gently.

“No! My father was a good man, an honest businessman. He may not have been a gentleman, but he was clever and hard-working, and he looked after his workers just as a gentleman looks after his servants and tenant farmers. He started as a manager in a small mill, and worked hard enough and invested shrewdly enough to become a mill owner himself, and I shall never be ashamed of him, never!”