The Children's Hour Read online

  Now, despite the relief and happiness, she was experiencing the first stirrings of anxiety. She was forced to admit that there was a whole part of Liam’s life to which she had no access: a no-go area that was closed to her. Had this been clear from the beginning or had she wilfully misled herself because she’d wanted him so badly? Even now, although Liam was full of apologies for his outburst and the current of love was flowing once more between them, Lyddie was obliged to face the fact that he had not budged an inch from his original position. The Place was his and she had no part or say in it. The subject of the loan to be raised against the house, along with her own offer, had been simply despatched straight back into that no-go area; it was as if these matters had never been raised and, despite her policy of negotiation at all costs, Lyddie had found herself unable to resurrect them. She knew why: the resumption of their loving, warm, easygoing pattern of life had been too precious to risk. He’d shown her his weapons – withdrawal of love, silence, coldness – and she’d quailed before them.

  She tried to convince herself that it was early days, that Liam could not be expected to change overnight with regards to his passion for his business. After all, she knew what it was like to love one’s job, she’d worked with professionals who juggled their work and their families; she knew that there had to be a certain amount of compartmentalization and a great deal of self-discipline. Five years of Liam’s life was bound up in the wine bar: it had been his whole world. She needed to make allowances, to give him space to adjust. Part of the cause of the row, she also told herself, had been to do with the VAT inspector’s visit; the timing had been most unfortunate and it was now obvious that Liam had been pretty uptight until the accounts had been given the all-clear. How quick he’d been then to make amends, to acknowledge his faults and to sweep away all her apologies for opening his letter. Nevertheless, it was also clear that that particular subject was closed, off limits, and, in her silent acquiescence, too grateful for his love to risk it again, she had surrendered her own principles.

  As the car fled along the A39, leaving Hartland Point and Bude to the west, circumnavigating Barnstaple and speeding away again towards the turning at Kentisbury Ford, Lyddie tried to convince herself that she was exaggerating, that they were both recovering from their first serious row, and that Liam would slowly relinquish his grip on the business and allow her to enter into it with him. She must be patient. The fear remained, however; a tiny shadow cast across her happiness.

  Both Mina and Nest were aware of it as they watched her playing with Toby and Flora or laughing and talking with Jack and Hannah. There was a febrile quality to her brightness that worried both of them but they were too concerned about Georgie to attach too much weight to it. They guessed that it might have something to do with Liam and, whilst they both felt the impotence of being obliged to stand back and watch a beloved child suffer, they also knew that marriage to such a one as Liam was bound to be hedged about with difficulties. They, like Lyddie’s colleagues in London, could see past the charm and sexiness, beyond the fascination and the challenge, to the determined, driven, restlessness that possessed Liam’s soul; but then, they were not in love with him.

  After lunch, however, Georgie was beginning to behave oddly enough to keep them both alert. She’d begun the day well, appearing to have a reasonable grasp on the proceedings. Nest managed to avoid irritating her, reminding herself not to fall into the trap of asking her sister if she remembered Hannah and the children, talking instead with Mina about the little family whilst the three of them had breakfast. Georgie had not contributed but appeared to be listening and taking it in.

  ‘After all,’ said Mina philosophically, as she and Nest cleared up afterwards, ‘Jack and Hannah know the score. I doubt they’ll be offended if Georgie muddles them with someone else, and the children won’t understand anyway.’

  ‘As long as she doesn’t . . .’ Nest hesitated, ‘you know – blurt something out.’

  Anxiety curdled Mina’s gut. ‘The thing is, we don’t know what it is she might blurt out.’

  Even as they stared at each other fearfully, a commotion was heard outside: Jack and his family had arrived. The sisters hurried through the hall, the dogs racing ahead, and out into the garden. Jack had already released Toby from his seat and he came hurtling round the front of the car to greet the dogs, whilst Flora could be heard struggling with Hannah and wailing, ‘No! No!’ and, ‘Get down! Get down!’ as her mother undid the straps of her chair.

  Jack kissed his aunts and looked tolerantly upon his family. Flora had now fought her way both out of the car and from Hannah’s restraining grasp and stood swaying uncertainly on the gravel, her gaze fixed upon the dogs.

  ‘Which is Nogood Boyo?’ asked Toby, kneeling amongst the three of them. He thought the name was exceedingly funny. ‘Why is he called Boyo? Why is he no good?’

  ‘Because he’s a very naughty person,’ explained Mina, ‘and he’s Welsh.’

  ‘What’s Welsh?’ asked Toby, puzzled, stroking Nogood Boyo’s head and submitting to being licked upon the cheek. ‘Why is he Welsh?’

  ‘Don’t,’ murmured Jack. ‘Please, Aunt, just don’t. After “no” and one or two other unsavoury words of the moment, “why”, “how” and “what” follow in quick succession. It won’t stop with defining “Welsh”, I promise you. Next it’ll be Dylan Thomas, his life and work, and after ten minutes you’ll be giving a dissertation on Under Milk Wood and then how will you explain Polly Garter, I wonder?’

  Mina tucked her hand under his arm, chuckling. ‘I was always taught that one should answer children’s questions,’ she said, ‘but your father and Nest gave me some very bad moments when they were small, I admit.’ To Toby she said: ‘Boyo’s a Sealyham. That’s the kind of dog he is. And Sealyhams come from Wales.’

  ‘Dogs are different makes, Tobes,’ Hannah told him. ‘You know that. The Bosun doesn’t look like these, does he? That’s because he comes from Switzerland. See?’

  ‘And the secret, at this point,’ said Jack, beaming at his aunts, ‘is that when he answers “No”, we all pretend we haven’t heard him. Now who was it mentioned something about coffee?’

  ‘Come on in,’ said Nest, feeling more light-hearted than she had for several weeks. ‘You are hopeless, Jack. It must be due to Hannah that the children are so good.’

  ‘My yoke-mate is a miracle of patience,’ he said, dodging a blow from his wife with a dexterity born of practice. ‘But teaching small boys all day long instils a high degree of self-preservation. Ah, here’s Aunt Georgie. Good morning, Aunt, and how are you?’

  Georgie allowed herself to be kissed, stared fixedly at Hannah for a moment and stood watching the proceedings as Flora was whisked upstairs to have her napkins changed, Toby reflected upon the rival merits of orange juice and milk, trying to decide which he might like best, and Nest and Mina chattered and joked with Jack. As usual, they relaxed quickly into the happy, carefree aura that he always so successfully created and, in the midst of their jollity, Lyddie and the Bosun arrived. Georgie was drawn smoothly into the conversation and even Flora, once she was allowed to have her juice sitting on the floor beside the Bosun, responded with a sunny amiability that charmed her older relatives.

  Lunch passed without too many alarms but now, as they sat drinking coffee in the drawing-room with the french doors open to the terrace, Mina grew aware of the change taking place in Georgie. She’d managed one or two fairly sharp observations during lunch – which because of lack of space had been a buffet arrangement with the children at the kitchen table – but now that particular expression, which Mina was learning to dread, was transforming Georgie’s face. Confused, even anguished, Georgie sat contemplating her family. In the drawing-room, the scene of so many family occasions, she seemed to drift in time, staring first at Toby, now at Flora, in puzzlement. She turned her eyes to Jack and saw Timmie sitting talking – but to whom? Was it Nest who sat beside him, leaning towards him, listening intently, as t
hey had so often sat together in the past? Yet here was Nest, wheeling her chair into the circle, reaching for her coffee . . .

  A child paused to look up at her, a small fair-haired boy with Timmie’s eyes, puzzled by her unnatural immobility. Georgie stared back at him, remembering. Of course, these two tinies were Timmie and Nest and the other two, the grown-ups, must be Timothy and Mama. She chuckled to herself . . .

  ‘I know a secret,’ she said to the child – but, before Toby could take her up on this, Mina turned quickly, thankful that the ebb and flow of conversation had covered Georgie’s words.

  ‘Toby,’ she said, ‘take this cup to your mother, darling. Carefully, now. Don’t spill.’

  Distracted, Toby carried the coffee to Hannah and then flopped down beside the Bosun, stroking his smooth head and kissing him upon the nose.

  ‘I wish we had a dog,’ he murmured plaintively, and his parents rolled their eyes despairingly at one another.

  A discussion about the fors and againsts of bringing up children with dogs around started up, and a tiny ‘po-po-po’ of relief escaped Mina’s lips, but she felt tense and fearful, as if awaiting a blow of some kind. Nest, catching her eye, raised her brows questioningly but Mina felt unable to respond lest someone should see her. She smiled reassuringly at Nest and glanced again at Georgie. She had the look of one who had been unfairly thwarted; she hunched her shoulders, as if bridling, and her lips were compressed. Yet there remained an air almost of triumph; the air of one who wielded a secret power and relished it.

  Lyddie was explaining, now, that she didn’t work on her computer, that she used it for typing and filing but that she didn’t edit on it.

  ‘It’s a different way of working,’ she was telling Jack, ‘and I have actually turned down work because it’s on disk. I’d have to learn it and, somehow, I just don’t want to go there.’

  ‘You should be more flexible,’ he said teasingly. ‘You should be ready to embrace new technology. Look at Aunt Mina and her e-mail.’

  ‘Well, there you are.’ Lyddie smiled affectionately at her aunt. ‘But then, Aunt Mina has always been a trend-setter. She’s a yes-person.’

  ‘Absolutely right,’ declared Jack. ‘That describes her perfectly. A yes-person.’

  ‘Oh, no.’ Georgie had been wriggling in her corner, listening intently, watching for an opportunity. ‘Not always, were you, Mina?’

  Mina clasped her hands together. ‘I don’t think I know what any of you mean,’ she countered lightly, praying for some kind of distraction.

  ‘Not always,’ insisted Georgie eagerly. ‘You didn’t say “yes” to Tony Luttrell, did you?’ She began to smile, watching their faces, seeing surprise fading into anxiety and curiosity, enjoying the sudden, uncomfortable silence.

  ‘Much too long ago to be interesting.’ Nest used the voice that had once quelled classes of young students to good effect. ‘Aren’t you going to take these children down to the sea, Jack? The poor old Bosun is waiting for that walk you promised him.’

  ‘The sea! The sea!’ chanted Toby, scrambling to his feet, whilst Flora, who had been enjoying a little doze on Hannah’s lap, woke suddenly and began to wail. The party broke up rapidly and Georgie was left alone, sitting on the sofa, still smiling.

  ‘I know a secret,’ she murmured – but there was nobody left to hear it.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Early in the evening, after the younger members of the family had gone, Mina, in her turn, walked down to the sea with the dogs.

  ‘Will you be OK?’ she asked Nest. ‘It’s just that I need to be alone for a bit. Georgie’s asleep so I think you can safely relax.’

  ‘I’ll be fine.’ Nest watched her anxiously. ‘It’s you I’m worried about.’

  Mina managed a smile. ‘No need. I shan’t be long.’

  She pulled on her blue Guernsey cardigan, picked up her stick from the brass holder by the front door and went away, along the terrace and through the small wicket gate that opened on to the path to the sea. It was rocky underfoot, stepped with roots from the trees that climbed the steep sides of the combe, and Mina walked carefully. The dogs were well ahead – scrabbling after a squirrel, who leaped and swung to safety in the branches of a tall beech – racing for the sheer joy of running with a thousand scents to lure them onwards. The stream tumbled along beside them, in full spate after the recent rain, cascading over the smooth, rounded boulders, lapping at the ferny banks. The dogs’ high, excited barks were drowned in the sound of its rushing, although Polly Garter trotted back to encourage her mistress onward to the sea. Mina was scarcely aware of her; she was travelling back in time, remembering a springtime fifty-five years before.

  It seems contrary to Mina that she should meet Tony Luttrell at a party given by the Goodenoughs; those Sneerwells whom she dislikes so much.

  ‘Do come, Mina,’ says Enid, having driven over one afternoon in the early spring of 1943 with the faithful Claude. ‘It’s not a terribly smart event. Just a little get-together with some officers of the SLI. I suppose you’ve heard of the Somerset Light Infantry?’ she says lightly to Lydia, whom she considers almost mentally deficient, buried away at Ottercombe. ‘They’ve been busy defending our Somerset coastline but I understand that they’ll soon be off on a more dangerous mission.’

  She likes to imply that she is in the know and Lydia, who has had a visit from one of the officers in regard to the beach at Ottercombe, is nevertheless quite happy to allow Enid her sense of superiority.

  ‘We need some pretty girls,’ says Claude with his sneering smile. ‘There’s a terrible shortage of them, don’t you know? We need Mina to swell the ranks.’

  ‘And what about Henrietta and Josie?’ asks Enid. ‘Surely Henrietta is old enough for parties? Will they be home from school for the holidays?’

  ‘Oh dear.’ Lydia grimaces a little. ‘It will have to be both or neither, I’m afraid. There is only a year between them, you know, and I simply couldn’t stand the fighting if Henrietta goes but not Josie.’

  ‘And will Mina mind the competition?’ Enid raises her thin brows teasingly.

  Lydia looks at her daughter, knowing her dislike of the Goodenoughs, not wishing to see her upset or coerced.

  ‘Of course I shouldn’t,’ says Mina, almost relieved, feeling that there will be safety in numbers. ‘It sounds rather fun. But Josie is only fifteen, you know, and they can both be a bit silly, sometimes. I hope they’ll behave themselves.’

  ‘Quite like the Bennet sisters,’ sniggers Claude. ‘Now, are you an Elizabeth or a Jane, I wonder?’

  ‘Mary Quilter’s coming,’ says Enid encouragingly, feeling that Claude has gone far enough and anxious that her party should be a success; three pretty girls, even if two of them are young and silly, are better than one. ‘You know Mary, don’t you? Her brother is an officer in the SLI. It will be fun, I promise you.’

  Mina feels a flicker of excitement. ‘But how shall we get over to you?’ she wonders. ‘I suppose we could cycle to Parracombe and catch the train to Lynton. Or maybe Seth might give us a lift . . .?’

  ‘Don’t worry about transport,’ says Enid kindly. ‘We’re all clubbing together with our petrol coupons so that one person can do a round trip. It’ll be a bit of a squash, mind, but that’s part of the fun, isn’t it? We’ve decided that we deserve a little bit of excitement. Now that’s settled, then.’

  Once they’ve gone, Mina looks apprehensively at her mother.

  ‘It will be fun,’ says Mama comfortingly. ‘And you don’t get much fun, Mina. I’m only sorry that you’ll still have Henrietta and Josie to keep an eye on. You have quite enough of that kind of thing here. Although it’s so much quieter, now that Jean and Sarah and the babies have gone.’

  ‘I don’t mind them coming. Actually, I’m rather pleased. I should feel terribly shy all on my own. You have to remember that I shall hardly know anyone there.’

  ‘You won’t have time to feel shy with Henrietta loose,’ predicts Mama. ‘A
nd now we must think about something to wear. I have some pretty things that should make up into something nice for you. There’s that lovely green shantung, which suits our colouring so perfectly. It’s much too long, of course, but we can do something about that. We’ll telephone Georgie and ask her what the latest fashion is in London. Do they still have fashions, I wonder, in wartime?’

  ‘But that’s one of your best frocks,’ says Mina, startled. ‘It would be such a shame to cut it.’

  ‘Nonsense.’ Mama touches her lightly on the cheek. ‘I shall never wear it again. Let’s tell the Tinies that you’ve been invited to a party. They’ll be so thrilled.’

  ‘And what about Henrietta and Josie?’

  ‘They must wear their school party frocks,’ answers Mama firmly. ‘Quite suitable for girls of their ages. And please don’t mention it in your letters to them. No need for them to know until they come home.’

  Mina feels that this is a shame – her sisters will lose all the thrill of anticipation – yet she knows that it is a wise decision. There will be no time for them to fall out over small pieces of finery or quarrel about whose garment is the prettiest.

  The Tinies are, indeed, excited by the forthcoming party. The Midnight Folk is being read during the children’s hour and they are enacting the story privately. Having endowed the young hero, Kay Harker, with a sister, Gerda – a sub-conscious nod to The Snow Queen – they spend their time searching for the Harker treasure. The owl in the woods is Blinky and the fox that they see in the gorse-covered slopes above the cleave is Mr Rollicum Bitem Lightfoot. They are rather at a loss, however, for substitutes for the evil Abner Brown and terrifying Sister Pouncer.

  ‘We could use the Sneerwells if they came oftener,’ says Nest sadly, ‘but it seems rather unfair to use Mina and Mama.’

  ‘We’ll simply have to,’ Timmie answers robustly. ‘It can’t be helped and, anyhow, they needn’t know. We’ll use Henrietta and Josie when they come home for Easter.’