Children of the Tide (18 page)

Betsy buttoned her boots onto her bare feet and threw a shawl over her dress and crept out of the door. She slipped through the hedge onto the path and gasped when Luke stepped out in front of her.

‘You came then?’ he said softly.

‘Yes.’ Her voice was low and tremulous.

He reached out his hand for hers. ‘Come on, then.’

Timidly she gave him her hand and then as he gave it a gentle squeeze, she smiled at him. They locked their fingers together and broke into a run, down the path and towards the copse.

‘Billy! Billy! Can you come into the office for a moment?’

Gilbert sat behind his father’s desk and pondered. So much to do. He really didn’t know where to start first. There was a pile of correspondence on the desk waiting for attention, and he didn’t know the answers to most of the queries which were contained in them.
I wasn’t cut out for business
, he thought, looking gloomily at the letters.
I’d much rather be out riding or playing cards
.

That thought reminded him that he was in debt for a considerable amount of money, money that he hadn’t got until his salary was due. The furniture for the house was costing a fortune, he mused. Yet Harriet would have it. Or her mother would, he considered. It was her doing, he was convinced. The house in Charlotte Street, where he and Harriet would live, was only a short walk from the Billingtons’ home in Albion Street, an imposing town house of four floors, where the Billingtons liked to entertain, when Mrs Billington was well enough. And if she wasn’t well, which was usually the case, then Harriet was called upon to be hostess to her father’s friends and business associates.

That will have to stop
, he determined.
Harriet is marrying me. I will not have her hurrying home at her mother’s or father’s every whim
.

‘Yes, Gilbert?’ Billy put his willowy frame around the door. ‘What can I do for you?’

‘Will you deliver some messages for me, and then if you’d go out to see your father? Tell him what’s
happened to my father, and say I would really appreciate it if he could come straight away.’

‘It’s really bad, is it – about Uncle Isaac?’ Billy’s face creased in sympathy. ‘I’m so sorry, Gilbert. Of course I’ll go. But I’ve no transport, no horse. I’ll have to borrow a mount or trap.’

‘Take my gig. I won’t need it. I’ll stay in Hull tonight.’ Wearily he rubbed his hands across his eyes. ‘I might well be needed at the hospital. They said they’d send for me if there was any news.’

‘Aunt Mildred? Where is she?’

‘Still at the hospital. She wouldn’t leave. I’ve arranged for her to spend tonight at the Billingtons’. She’s worn out. It’s only a step across from the Infirmary, so she’s agreed.’

‘Right. I’ll just clear my desk and then go. They’ll come, my parents, be sure of that, Gilbert. They’ll be here first thing in the morning.’

Billy went down into the yard and asked one of the stable lads to prepare Caesar and Brutus for the journey, then he went back inside to clear his desk and tell Hardwick that he would not be available until the following day.

‘’
Polar Star Two
will be leaving early tomorrow, Mr Billy. Will you be here?’

Billy shook his head. ‘I can’t get back in time. Remind Mr Gilbert, will you? He’s got a lot on at the moment, with Mr Rayner being so ill, but I’m sure he’ll be there.’

Tradition had it that a senior member of Masterson and Rayner was always at the dock side to see their ships depart for the Arctic, and the
Polar Star Two
was leaving at dawn for the Greenland fishing grounds after a major refit and strengthening.

Billy clicked his tongue, shook the reins and moved off out of the yard.
They’re beautiful animals
, he thought,
but I don’t know if they’ll care for the rough roads out at Holderness. Such elegant creatures, they’re only suited for high-stepping over flagstones and cantering down turnpikes
.
The horses which he rode on his father’s estate were sturdy mounts, used to the muddy, rutted roads of the country.

He drove first into Lowgate to deliver one of Gilbert’s messages and then turned the gig down the side of Holy Trinity Church to deliver another. He whistled a boy to hold the reins while he went into the office of a chandler, and when he came out he saw that there were now three children standing by the gig. He reached into his pocket to give the lad a coin and climbed back into the gig.

‘Hello, sir.’ One of the children, a girl, spoke up. ‘These is a nice pair of hosses.’

He nodded and smiled. ‘Yes, aren’t they!’

‘Wish I could have a ride!’

‘Not today, I’m in rather a hurry.’ He looked down at her. Her face was sooty and her hair knotted and disarrayed, but she had an appealing grin and a free and easy manner.

‘Tha doesn’t remember us, does tha?’ she said as he prepared to move off. ‘From that night – outside theatre?’

‘Oh! Yes, of course.’ He tightened the reins to hold the horses. ‘I do remember.’

She nodded. ‘We didn’t make much that night, not when we counted up. Onny enough for a bit o’ bread.’

‘Do you live around here?’ He’d asked her before and she had refused to say. This time, though her face shuttered, she cast a thumb over her shoulder and vaguely waved it down the street.

‘Over yonder.’

He glanced down the street. There were mainly offices and business rooms clustered around the church, with courts and alleyways running off, and a warehouse on North Church Side, which had burnt almost to the ground, stood derelict and abandoned with its roof open to the skies.

‘Come on, Jenny.’ One of the boys tugged at her skirt. ‘We’ll get nowt else here.’

‘All right, I’m coming.’ She seemed reluctant to leave. ‘Where ’you going, mister?’

‘I’m going home, to the country. To see the sea,’ he added.

‘What does tha mean?’ she laughed. ‘See what?’

‘To see the sea,’ he grinned. ‘The ocean!’

The girl looked uncomprehendingly at him. ‘I don’t know what tha means. What ocean?’

He leaned towards her and saw a questioning, responsive longing in her face. ‘The ocean that the River Humber runs into. It’s like a big pond, Jenny. Bigger than any of the docks where the ships are. And the ships, when they sail down the River Humber, sail into the German Ocean and across to other lands.’

‘Like ’Arctic?’ she said eagerly.

‘That’s right,’ he smiled. ‘Good girl.’ He shook the reins. ‘I have to go now. Good-bye, Jenny.’

She slowly raised her hand. ‘Be seeing you, sir.’

He turned to look back as he reached the main street again. The children had gone. There was no sign of them. He frowned, how could they have disappeared so quickly? He shrugged and turned the gig towards the North Bridge and the long road to Holderness.

The familiar hummocky landscape seemed to stretch for ever in front of him. A vast, unfolding plain of green and brown, with a twisting, meandering road leading on as if to the edge of the world. Within the boundary of hawthorn hedges, an occasional small white cottage or dwelling house hid, with red-roofed wagon shed or cow house; or beside a thicket of trees, clusters of farm buildings sheltered, their red pantiles and grey slate tiles standing out against the brick buildings and the leafy green shelter belt; vast wide skies unfurled a moving panorama of drifting white clouds, swooping seabirds, lapwings and sparrow-hawks.

Billy deliberated as he let the pair have their heads along the empty road.
Gilbert will take over the firm now
that Uncle Isaac is ill. He won’t come back now, not even if he recovers. Gilbert will be in charge
, he mused,
and I don ‘t think he will function very well. And as for me, well, I can’t see myself forever in shipping; but what else is there? I don’t want to waste my life
. His thoughts turned to the beggar children, to the eager upturned face of the young Jenny.

What a waste of life that is
, he pondered.
She seemed so eager for knowledge when I was telling her about the sea, and yet she’s doomed to spend her life begging, or else
– he gave a small shudder as he thought of the whore who had accosted him –
or else a life of prostitution. If only there was something I could do. How I wish I could help her
.

‘I mustn’t be long, Luke,’ Betsy breathed as they ran towards the copse. ‘I’m afraid of being missed.’

‘Oh, Betsy. Nobody will be up yet. They’ll all be sleeping.’

The cuckoo echoed above them, and they both looked up as the big brown bird flew from the woods over their heads.

‘Sammi will miss me, she’ll wonder where I am.’

He drew her towards him as they entered the copse. ‘It’ll be all right,’ he insisted. ‘Don’t worry. Come here.’

He kissed her on her mouth and she pulled away and hung her head. ‘It’s not right, is it?’ she whispered. ‘I ought not to be here with you.’

He ran his hands along her face and neck and across her shoulders. ‘Who should you be here with then, Betsy, if not with me? Is there somebody else tha’d rather be with?’

‘Oh, no! I didn’t mean that.’ She looked up at him, longing for him to kiss her again. ‘You know I didn’t. It’s just that I’m scared—’

‘Don’t be.’ He started to unfasten the buttons on her bodice, but his fingers were clumsy and she put her hand up to his to help him.

She wanted him to hold her the way he had before, when he’d cupped her breasts into his mouth and teased her nipples with his tongue. A pulse started to throb in her throat and she felt her heart pounding. Her body throbbed in so many places, places that were becoming soft and yielding.

This time she didn’t object when he placed his
jacket on the ground, and she sat on it whilst he lay on the ground beside her, crushing the white flowers of Jack-in-the-woods beneath him and releasing its pungent aroma. He pulled her bodice from her shoulders and gently pulled her down, holding and stroking her naked breasts and bending to kiss each in turn. She licked her lips and held his head between her hands, her breathing becoming faster.

‘Do you like that, Betsy?’ he asked softly as he lifted his head to look at her.

‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘Yes.’

His hand stole beneath her skirt and she knew that this time she wouldn’t stop him. Didn’t want to stop him as his fingers explored every sinuous curve and valley of her rounded buttocks and arching belly which she thrust towards him.

She closed her eyes and then opened them as he pushed aside her skirt and with his muscular legs straddled her and held her fast. ‘Wait, Luke.’ She was trembling. ‘No. We mustn’t.’

He didn’t answer. Though he looked at her, his blue eyes were glazed as if hypnotized, and his lips parted as he ran his tongue over them.

‘Luke! You’re hurting me.’ Tears stung her eyes. She didn’t think that it would be like this. He was breaking her in two. Why didn’t he stop? ‘Luke. Please. Please stop.’

‘I can’t,’ he gasped as he bore down upon her. ‘It’s too late!’ His fingers gripped her arms with powerful bruising strength as he shuddered and then lay still. ‘I’m sorry.’

She cried as he held her close and whispered that he was sorry. ‘I thought you wanted it too, Betsy. You seemed as if you did.’

‘I didn’t know. I didn’t know that it would hurt,’ she sobbed quietly. She hadn’t known, hadn’t guessed that he would be so big. It wasn’t like when she had seen her brothers run naked around the yard after washing under the pump. She hadn’t known that
he would enter her with such vigour and strength.

‘It hurt me too, Betsy,’ he murmured into her hair.

‘Did it?’ she gulped, and wondered then why he had done it, or perhaps like her he hadn’t known.

He nodded and wiped away her tears with his fingers. ‘You see, it’s ’cos you were a virgin. It’s a bit like coming across a locked door. If you haven’t got a key then you’ve got to use a bit of force to open it. But now that ’door’s open, it won’t hurt so much next time.’

Her lip pouted. ‘There’ll be no next time. I shan’t let it happen again.’

He smiled lazily at her and ran his fingers around her nipples. ‘Is tha sure about that, Miss Betsy?’

She pulled away from him and started to fasten up her bodice, he was making her tingle and throb again in spite of feeling sore and bruised. Then she turned again towards him and once more undid the buttons at her breast. ‘Just kiss me, Luke,’ she whispered. ‘Like you did before, that’s what I like best.’

He laughed softly and shook his head at her. ‘Tha can’t have one without ’other, Miss Betsy. It drives a fellow wild.’

‘Does it?’ she said huskily, as he fastened his mouth around her breast. ‘But you said that it hurt.’

‘Aye, it does, but it’s worth it.’ He breathed heavily. ‘And you’d better get dressed or else I shan’t be able to stop myself again. I’ll see you again tomorrow morning, shall I?’

‘I don’t know,’ she answered. ‘I said, didn’t I, that I wouldn’t let it happen again.’

He lay on his back and watched her through half-closed eyes. ‘Well, I allus knew that it would happen, sooner or later.’ He grinned at her. ‘I allus knew I’d have ’miller’s daughter.’

‘What do you mean?’ she demanded. ‘How could you know?’

He pulled up a stalk of red campion and teased her cheek with it. ‘I allus used to say to ’village lads, I’ll
be first wi’ Miss Betsy.’ His eyes teased hers. ‘I had a bet on it.’

Horror-struck, she stared at him. ‘You don’t mean that?’ Her eyes filled with tears. ‘Say you don’t mean it?’ She shook his arm. ‘Please, Luke. If my father heard – or my brothers—’

He pulled her down again towards him, his mouth against her ear. ‘If you’ll come again tomorrow, then I won’t claim my bet.’

‘Promise?’ she whispered, feeling herself melting once more.

‘Aye, I promise, Miss Betsy. I’ll not tell ’other lads. It’ll be our secret.’

Sammi woke again and saw the sun streaming through the window. She sat up abruptly.
I’d better get up and give Betsy a hand, and then I can go and see Adam
. She felt a warm glow when she thought of the child; how he was filling out with the abundance of milk that Mrs Bishop was so lavishly providing. His little belly was becoming rounded and he was stretching and reaching with his tiny fingers and toes.