Softly Grow the Poppies (2 page)

By this time she had reached the gig which was headed in the opposite direction from the city and Rose was astonished and speechless, for surely the girl knew that? She was holding out her hand to Rose and Rose took it. It was shaken heartily.

The girl, Alice Weatherly, stood and waited, smiling.

‘Well?’ she said.

‘Well what?’

‘Are you going into Liverpool?’

‘I had not intended to. I was about to . . .’

The girl’s face fell and reluctantly she let go of Rose’s hand, which she still held. ‘Oh dear, then I’ll just have to walk it.’ Her face brightened and Rose was quite fascinated by her change of expression. ‘Where
are
you going, may I ask? It might take me part of the way.’

‘I’m going into Old Swan. My maid needs some thread and the kitchen-maid wants to knit socks for the soldiers so I am going to buy khaki wool and at the same time I thought I might see what was happening now that war has been declared. Anyway, what’s so important about the station that you must get there so precipitously?’ Rose went on.

The expression on the girl’s face turned to one of astonishment. ‘It’s the troops . . .’

‘Troops?’

‘The soldiers who are going to fight the Germans. Five infantry divisions and one of cavalry. Charlie Summers is going since he’s a cavalry officer, a captain, and he’s taking Lady and Duke—’

‘May I ask what all this has to do with me, Miss Weatherly?’ Rose interrupted.

The upper-class society of Liverpool was close-knit, the Earl and Countess of Derby being at the very top of the pile and an invitation to Knowsley, the seat of Lord Derby, was much sought after but not by herself. She knew of the Weatherlys of course, for they were a wealthy family living close to Beechworth House.

Arthur Weatherly inherited from his father a thriving business importing and exporting goods to many parts of the world. He was known as somewhat of a bully, keeping his wife, before she died, under his thumb and it was said that he was attempting to do the same with his pretty daughter. A baronet, at least, was what he wanted for her and this Charlie Summers she spoke of and of whom he disapproved came from an old family, land rich but money poor. True, his father was a baronet but since Charlie was the younger son, a soldier and with no hope of succeeding to the title, it was not surprising he frowned on his only child’s apparent attachment to him.

‘Oh, do please call me Alice.’ She smiled her endearing, innocent smile and Rose could not help but smile back.

‘Perhaps we could go to Liverpool in your gig, Miss . . . Miss . . .?’

‘Rose Beechworth.’

‘Oh, please, Rose,’ for it seemed Miss Alice Weatherly scorned the niceties of the day which said that people in their station should use surnames on such a short acquaintance. ‘Can we not go into Liverpool for whatever your maids need and while we are there you could drop me off at Lime Street. The train leaves at noon and Charlie will be so disappointed if I’m not there to see him off. I promised him. Of course he won’t be away for long. A little skirmish, he calls it, all over by Christmas.’

Rose sighed, looking about her as though for inspiration. The growing heat of the day and the bright morning sunshine lit the hedges that ran along the field belonging to Lark Hill Dairy with what was called Jack-by-the-Hedge, with white campion, with red campion, with ragged robin and all the lovely summer plants that thrived there. Beyond the hedge the meadow was peaceful, half a dozen cows grazing, the cowman who had just put them out after milking trudging back towards the dairy. A flickering movement caught her eye, which was drawn to a shrew-mouse darting its long flexible nose in search of insects or worms, a pretty, harmless creature that seemed at odds with the violence that threatened to tear apart the calm existence she had known all her life.

Her grandfather had started building the family fortune in the middle of the last century. In 1852 gold had been found in a far-off place on the other side of the world. A foreign place with the foreign name of Yackandandah in Victoria, Australia. Her father had told her that her grandfather William had been one of the first diggers on the scene. He had been a young man with a wanderlust not satisfied with what he had in Liverpool, which was nothing. Yackandandah’s nearest town was called Beechworth, and that was enough to convince William Beechworth he should seek his fortune there. He found gold hanging in the roots of shrubs that he pulled up from the creek, which had proved incredibly rich in gold. Grandfather William had returned to England a man of means and from those riches his son, Rose’s father, had increased the family fortunes a hundredfold, leaving Rose Beechworth one of the wealthiest heiresses in Lancashire. She had often thought of taking ship to Australia and visiting the area of Yackandandah from which had come her fortune and had vowed that one day she would but life was remarkably pleasant, now that she was totally independent, the owner of shares in a shipping company, the railway, mining in Yorkshire which day by day made her even richer and, more importantly, dependent on no man. She pictured in her mind the beautiful home that her grandfather had bequeathed to his descendants, for despite his low beginnings he had been a man of great taste. The house was set on a slight rise of land, the grounds falling away from it in smooth, well-cared-for lawns, flowerbeds aflame with colour at this time of the year. The beds were surrounded by clipped box hedges, their luscious green setting off the white gleam of garden statues. A covered trellised walk led to a summerhouse set by a small lake, the walk festooned with hanging baskets trailing ferns and pink roses while the lake itself was starred with lilies disturbed only by the smooth glide of the swans drifting effortlessly from bank to bank.

The house was furnished in the fashion of the nineteenth century but with none of the clutter so beloved of the times. The rooms were large and airy which the wives of her father and grandfather Beechworth, women of refinement and taste, had furnished with elegance and flair. A richly carpeted hallway was furnished with a long-case clock that ticked importantly at the foot of the wide staircase, a marble nymph set in a fluted recess, and deep velvet chairs before an enormous fireplace over which hung a gilt-framed mirror. There was a drawing room filled with costly ornaments, a French clock in ormolu and enamel, vases of rococo Sèvres, and ornaments of Coalport and Meissen. Chandeliers created shimmering, dancing light in every room including the dining room, which though high and wide was barely filled by the highly polished oval table and matching velvet chairs, twenty of them. A sideboard ran along one side with niches and shelves to accommodate silver dishes, a crystal lamp and porcelain. Also on the ground floor were a breakfast room, a library, a study and to the side a conservatory, known as a ‘winter garden’ when it was built. There were a dozen bedrooms, most of them never used, and even the very latest of bathrooms which she herself had designed and had installed.

The house had bay windows to the front and overlooking the gardens at the side and a terrace on which dozens of pots bloomed with geraniums. A vegetable garden, a tennis court, again never used since she had no one to play with, and the whole surrounded by woodland, parkland and at the edge of the property pastures where the horses browsed. She could do exactly what she wanted, go exactly where she pleased and though she was aware that Dolly, who had helped to deliver her into the world twenty-four years ago would fret until she returned home, she was very tempted to take this sweet-faced child into Liverpool.

Alice saw the indecision on Rose’s face. ‘Please say yes,’ Alice begged. ‘I’ll be no trouble, really. It’s miles into town and if I don’t get there soon Charlie will have gone.’

‘I suppose you . . . well, I suppose you like this Charlie?’

‘We love each other.’

Rose smiled and pulled a face. ‘Dear God in heaven, little did I know when I set out this morning I’d be . . .’ She was about to say ‘playing cupid’ but Rose had never been in love so the shining light in Alice Weatherly’s face was a mystery to her. Nevertheless it was there, as pure and innocent as that of a child and who was she to scoff at it? The girl’s eyes were like sapphires, now so vivid a blue they were startling. Sapphires with a diamond in their depths, or was it a star? Dear God, she was getting all romantic, sentimental, which was not like her.

Alice’s voice interrupted her thoughts. ‘I’m so sorry. I can see I’m a nuisance. I can probably get a lift somewhere on the route. I’ve no money for a cab, and I’ve actually never been out on my own, you see.’ She made a face of self-deprecation. ‘Isn’t that an awful admission at eighteen and in this day and age where young women are doing all sorts of things, college and . . . and then there are the suffragettes and what they are fighting for. I’ve often thought I would like to be one of them,’ she said wistfully, ‘but my father is very protective.’ She sighed then brightened. ‘So if you could tell me in which direction I should go I would be most obliged.’

Rose grinned. ‘Oh, for God’s sake, hop up. I could do with an adventure myself and there will be lots of things going on in town, especially if your Charlie is there to tell us what’s happening and where he’s off to.’

Alice’s face lit up and her smile threatened to blind Rose. She was utterly amazed by her own behaviour but for some reason this artlessly naïve, childlike young woman who was six years younger than herself appealed to some part of her she did not recognise. She knew herself to be resistant to frivolity, to light-mindedness, to much of the heedless search for
fun
with which girls of her class were imbued, but this child, for she seemed no more than that, intrigued her and she really would like to see the soldiers set off for France. Of course she had read about it in the newspapers but had not really understood why it was happening. It was all a bit confusing and to be honest a lot of fuss about nothing. Who cared whether Russia expanded in the Baltic or the eastern Mediterranean? The British were determined to keep the port of Constantinople from falling into Russian hands. Russia wanted to carve up the Turkish Empire, and the Germans had marched on Belgium at which the British were appalled but she supposed there must be a lot more to it than that. But did the ordinary working man care about it? They had never heard of many of these places and were hardly aware of the bitter conflict that had been going on for a year or more. Now, for some reason, France and Great Britain had declared war on Germany!

And here was this enchanting young woman, alight with love and patriotism, off to Lime Street railway station to see the man she loved take a train for this mad muddle.

Alice scrambled up into the gig, thanking Rose again and again, chattering vivaciously as they moved along country lanes and then the broader thoroughfares of the outskirts of Liverpool, on each side of which were the smart villas of the middle classes. Then they went through the warren of cramped terraced houses on the edge of the city, passing shops, factories, warehouses and the Royal Infirmary, until they reached the top of Brownlow Hill.

And there it all was: the great city of Liverpool and at the bottom of the hill the railway station. The trams seriously offended Sparky who had never in his life been further than a couple of miles from home, driven by Rose along quiet lanes and through country villages. Whenever Rose, with her maid, came into Liverpool on her infrequent visits to her dressmaker or boot-maker, or milliner, they were brought in the carriage driven by Thomas, the coachman. So to Sparky and the woman who held the reins, doing her best to control his panic, this seemed absolute chaos. Not only trams but also horse-drawn vehicles, drays and wagons, men on bicycles impatiently ringing their bells, carriages and, worst of all, the new phenomenon, the motor car.

Alice looked quite relaxed in all the confusion but Rose realised that her little gig with a panic-stricken Sparky beginning to rear and lunge was a danger not only to the vehicles in the road but to the pedestrians who had come to the city to see their boys off. What’s more, the khaki-clad soldiers who marched towards Lime Street blocked most of the way. Packing the pavements were huge, cheering crowds, little boys who ‘hallooed’ and threw their caps in the air, old men with tears in their eyes, perhaps remembering their own enthusiastic youth fighting in the Boer War. Women and girls blew kisses and waved their handkerchiefs and a band played ‘It’s a Long Way to Tipperary’, stirring music to keep the soldiers in step on this great expedition.

Sparky did not care for it at all, causing even more chaos until Rose, handing the reins to Alice who was, fortunately, used to driving a gig about the grounds of Weatherly House, got down and put her arms around his neck in an effort to soothe him.

‘We’ll have to find somewhere to put him,’ Rose shouted above the din to Alice who held on bravely. They were by this time turning into Lime Street and before them was the magnificence of the Adelphi Hotel. A sign pointed to the back of the hotel to stables where guests’ horses were cared for. Threading her way through the dangerous crush Rose managed at last to get Sparky and the gig to the stable yard where a groom, delighted to be of service to two such attractive ladies, declared he would keep an eye on the slowly calming pony.

Alice was the daughter, in fact the only child, of Arthur Weatherly, a prominent gentleman in the world of shipping and it was whispered that when the company began in 1709 it had dealt in slaves. The first of the Weatherly Line vessels had sailed from Liverpool to the West Indies and brought back slaves, the trade growing so that by the 1750s over 25,000 had been transported. One street in town where the sale of black men, women and children had been held was even called Negro Street but the lucrative trade came to an end at the beginning of the nineteenth century when Arthur Weatherly’s predecessors had turned to other cargoes and the company continued to thrive.

Alice had been gently reared, protected, mixing with families of her own social standing, kept to the schoolroom and accompanied wherever she went at all times by her governess, her mother before she died, or a groom.