Thirty four
When Blake got back he thought that everybody had gone to bed, it was quiet. He went around switching lights off until he came to the sitting-room and there Sylvester was seated in an armchair before the fire with a brandy glass in his hand.
‘Join me,’ he said.
Blake helped himself to brandy and he reflected that this was probably the most enjoyable thing that Sylvester had taught him over the years. He sat down across the fire, only saying as he did so, ‘Did you let the dogs out?’
‘I did. I thought I might have had a long wait for you.’
‘No such luck,’ Blake said roundly.
‘Is that what you want?’
‘I suppose not. It was your scheming, Sylvester. You asked her.’
‘I thought you were in love with the girl.’
‘It was a long time ago.’
‘Can you stop loving people when you have done so completely?’
‘You can when they don’t love you. I was always a very poor second best. Alistair was always first.’
‘He’s dead.’
‘Yes.’ Blake sat back and sipped his brandy and sighed. ‘What competition. He’ll never get any older, he’ll never do anything wrong, his child is always there to keep his memory alive, he won’t make any mistakes or betray anybody or fall over.’
‘What was he like?’
‘He was kind and good-tempered, loyal and talented . . .’
‘That’s a lot to like about a man who married the woman you loved.’
‘He was my brother.’
‘Ah.’ Sylvester looked down into his brandy. ‘I’m so sorry.’
‘Annie didn’t tell me when he died and when I found out . . .’
‘You should have told me. When things hurt you I want to know. You don’t stop loving people when they die, that’s the hardest part. You go on loving them with nothing to sustain you until you dry out. I love Laura still and it’s been such a long time. I dream about her often and she’s just as she was, young and beautiful, just like Annie. People should marry again. If you go on too long standing around on the sidelines it dehumanises you. You start being smug and thinking you know more than other people and despising them. I loved Irene so very much but I don’t want you to give up your right to be part of things. I’ve asked Hetty if she’ll be my wife.’
Blake laughed.
‘Have you? Has she said yes?’
‘Being a very sensible woman she has. It’s a financial arrangement really. It means I won’t have to pay her any more,’ and Sylvester chuckled. ‘Do you know what I’m going to do? I’m going to give her the best of everything. I’m going to buy her the biggest diamond I can find. I’m going to swathe her in furs and give her a Rolls Royce and take her to Paris for her clothes. What do you think about that?’
‘I just hope she’s going to go on doing the cooking, that’s all. Cooks are harder to find than wives,’ Blake said.
‘You are not a gentleman, sir,’ Sylvester said, grinning. ‘Would you like some more brandy?’
‘I’d love some.’
Sylvester poured the brandy and then sat down.
‘Ask her to marry you,’ he said.
‘I can’t. She’d only turn me down.’
‘Can she afford to turn down a rich man? I thought she was living in a tiny house in a back street and had to work at some mediocre alehouse in order to survive. Does she know how rich you are?’
‘I don’t want that.’
‘My dear boy, you really must try to live in the world. Women always marry men for their money, how else are they to survive?’
‘She wouldn’t have me the first time because I was poor.’
‘Well then.’
* * *
When Annie had the invitation to Sylvester and Hetty’s wedding she panicked. In the first place she didn’t want to go and in the second she had nothing that she could wear among rich people. Her mother and Madge came to her rescue. Her mother said that she ought to go and Madge offered to loan her some clothes. Being left with no excuse Annie went.
Sylvester sent a car for her. No one, she thought, could accuse him of modesty. It was a Rolls Royce with a uniformed chauffeur. Annie wanted to take cover as they glided majestically down the dale. Susan was excited and stared out of the window.
They were to go to the house first. On the outskirts of Sunderland they turned in at gates and there were big parklands on either side with trees and huge lawns and finally a big stone house where the drive swept up to the entrance.
Susan clambered out of the car before the chauffeur could reach her and dashed up the steps just as Blake came out of the house. He got down and swept her up into his arms and she shrieked with delight.
‘Hello, Annie. My, don’t you look fine.’
‘Do you think so?’ Annie said anxiously.
‘Edible,’ Blake said and he kissed her on the cheek.
Sylvester came out too and Anthony. The children went off to play and Sylvester ordered coffee for Annie but she wanted to see the bride and went upstairs. Hetty was wearing sugar pink and it suited her. Annie told her so.
‘These clothes were so dear, you can’t imagine,’ Hetty said.
‘I think I can. Are you nervous?’
‘Terrified.’
‘Sylvester is a wonderful man.’
‘He’s a bossy old soul but beggars can’t be choosers,’ Hetty said, smiling.
‘Are there going to be many people at the wedding?’
‘Annie, Sylvester doesn’t know the meaning of the word small. He’s invited everybody in Sunderland.’
‘Oh dear,’ Annie said.
She didn’t have to worry. She was treated like one of the family. She went to the church with Blake and the two children and when it came to the reception she sat on the top table with them. Annie had difficulty in not feeling very important.
There was a dance at the house in the evening and it did Annie’s soul good to note that the ballroom was bigger than the one at the Hall. Throughout the day there was crate after crate of champagne though she tried not to drink much and in the evening there was Anthony’s nanny to put the children to bed. All Annie had to do was go up and kiss her child goodnight. Then she danced.
Dancing with Blake brought back memories of the village hall and of the first time that he had kissed her. His dancing was even better now. Perhaps, Annie thought, he got a lot of practice. It was a warm summer evening. People wandered outside. There were big ponds in the grounds and a stream some way from the house. Annie was asked to dance all the time and escaped to the garden late in the evening. She sat down on a low wall beside a formal part where there were lots of stones and crazy paving and intricate geometrical lawns and sharply cut shrubs.
Blake found her there, handed her a glass of champagne.
‘I don’t think I should have any more,’ Annie said, taking the glass reluctantly.
‘Would you rather have something else?’
‘A cup of tea would be nice.’
‘I’ll go and—’
‘No. Don’t. I’m quite happy just sitting here.’
They hadn’t seen each other for weeks. Sylvester and Hetty had been often to Western Isle and had Anthony with them but Blake had been working.
‘How’s the dale?’ he asked.
‘It never changes.’
‘That’s what I like best about it. Susan’s grown such a lot since I’ve seen her.’
‘She didn’t forget you.’
‘Are you still working at the pub?’
‘Yes but I’ve got another job as well, in a café. It’s just during the summer season but it helps.’
‘What do you do with Susan?’
‘She spends a lot of time with my parents. They like it – at least most of the time – but I wish I could see her more. It isn’t easy.’
‘Do you remember telling me that you wanted a nice house with a garden for the children to play in, a car and some decent clothes and a china cabinet and a piano and to talk to people who know things?’
‘Sometimes I shudder for your memory,’ she said.
‘There’s the shipyard and a chain of shops, a sizeable chunk of half a dozen ships and a fish and chip restaurant.’
‘A fish and chip shop?’
‘Irene’s grandmother had it. She ran a pub too.’
‘What happened to the beautiful blonde?’ Annie said. ‘The one you kissed down by the river.’
‘It just didn’t work out.’
‘She turned you down?’
‘You were the only person who turned me down.’
‘Don’t think I haven’t regretted it,’ Annie said flippantly. ‘The night you walked into that dance with Irene, I could have scratched her eyes out. You looked . . . so rich, so classy.’
‘But you had Alistair.’
‘Yes.’
‘Annie, look. I don’t want my child to grow up like I did. I want him to have parents. I want him to have a mother. I can give you a lot. I can get you out of there, that little house and those awful jobs. We could buy a nice house and Susan could go to the best schools. She could be brought up at Western Isle, at least part of the time. You want that, don’t you?’
‘Yes, but—’
‘Will you marry me?’
‘No.’
The warm evening was suddenly full of sound, birds, the stream, distant passing traffic.
‘Why not?’ Blake asked.
‘How could I marry you for reasons like that after what I did to you? I didn’t marry Alistair for who he was, it was because I cared for him. I did care for you, I think it was something to do with being brought up together and having so much time and you were like Alistair even then. In a way I learned how to love him from you. How can I marry you now, you live in a different world? You need somebody like Irene. I’m not like that. I don’t think I could be polite to people at dinner parties, wear the correct dresses and be David Blake’s wife. I’d hate it.’
‘You’d rather stay in the dale in that tiny house and be a waitress?’
‘No, of course I wouldn’t but—’
‘You wouldn’t marry me when I was poor—’
‘Blake—’
‘You could always marry somebody else of course, somebody you won’t confuse with Alistair.’
He would have walked away but Annie got hold of his arm.
‘Don’t be angry, please. Everything’s changed. You don’t belong in the dale any more and I’ll never belong anywhere else—’
‘That’s not true. You can be anything you want to be. You’re not really going to turn me down? Not when I can give Susan all that. Tell me you’re expecting a better offer any minute?’
Annie laughed shortly.
‘In the dale?’
‘Last time of asking.’
Annie hesitated and then nodded. It was for Susan, she consoled herself.
Thirty five
Blake wanted to buy Annie an engagement ring. She always wore the diamond solitaire which Alistair had given her as well as her wedding ring and although she tried to talk herself into taking off these rings she couldn’t so in the end she moved them on to her right hand and let him buy her sapphires. She felt quite sick in the shop in Newcastle. She could choose it all separately, whichever stones she wanted, all of them bigger than the single diamond which glinted on her right hand. In the end she couldn’t do it, apologised and walked out of the shop. Blake didn’t say anything to her, he bought her some tea but Annie spilt it into the saucer and the tears dropped and splashed. Blake gave her a handkerchief.
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be such an insensitive bastard. We won’t bother.’
‘No, I . . . no, I want a ring. I just don’t want anything big, if you see what I mean. Could we not just go into a shop and buy something – something modest?’
The sapphires she finally allowed him to buy her were very modest indeed. They were all that Annie could bear. Her family reacted just as she had thought they would. Tommy wondered if he had a magnifying glass and her mother thought Blake was mean.
‘I thought he had money,’ she said, letting go of Annie’s hand.
Clara and Madge very delicately said nothing. It was the same with clothes and cars and fur coats. She wouldn’t let him buy her anything. They were to be married very quietly in the village church and there was to be no honeymoon. Blake had wanted to be married in Sunderland with lots of people and a big reception but Annie’s parents wouldn’t hear of her being married anywhere but the village church where she had been christened and confirmed and been married to Alistair.
Annie didn’t realise until too late that this was a mistake and as soon as she knew it she couldn’t understand why she hadn’t seen the problem from the beginning. By then Blake had stopped trying to persuade her about anything. The only thing he had insisted on was that they should go back to Sunderland after the reception to Sylvester’s house and that Hetty and Sylvester would stay at Western Isle with the children. Annie hadn’t the strength to argue.
If her first wedding day had been difficult her second was much worse. There were no guests except the family and since Blake had no family there was only Hetty and Sylvester and Anthony on his side. They had a small lunch at Western Isle and every second that she was there Annie expected Charles Vane’s voice from the top of the stairs, shouting at her. In the middle of the afternoon she went out to the stables and cuddled one of the horses and cried. She was glad to be away. Nobody seemed to remember what to say to anybody.
She had worn a cream dress, wide and swinging with a neat waist and a big cream hat. The dress was pretty but it was nothing like the long white dress which she had worn for her first wedding. When they set off for Sunderland she couldn’t look up at the track which led to Sunniside.
Nobody said anything all the way back to Sunderland. Annie felt as though she was going to the other side of the world. It was one of those wet foggy November days which are barely light. Annie had wanted to wait until the spring or at least Christmas but Blake had wanted to get married. The last leaves had dropped from the trees and lay in piles of mud by the roadside and the tyres swished wetly as he drove. Annie had changed. The dress was new to her, it had been Madge’s, barely worn, but Annie thought now that it suited Madge and the weather, not her, it was all browns and greens. Blake had said nothing about the dress but she had no desire to know what he was thinking. He rarely said what he thought.
When the car swept to a halt in front of the big door the
rain had stopped and night had fallen. There was a light on outside and although there was no one at the house it soon became obvious to Annie that careful preparations had been made and that people had been there up till a very short time ago.
There was a wonderful smell of lavender polish, the hall had freshly cut flowers and so did the rooms. Cut-glass vases filled with big, bushy chrysanthemums, yellow and white. There were huge log fires as well as central heating and in the kitchen the refrigerator was full of food, some of it already cooked, ready to be heated. There were bottles of champagne in there too.
‘Do you want champagne?’
‘I’d rather have tea.’
‘Something told me you would,’ and Blake pushed up the lid on the Aga and put on the big shiny kettle.
‘I’m sorry, Blake, I didn’t mean to be awkward.’
‘It’s no bother.’
‘No, I didn’t mean about the tea. I know it isn’t easy for you either. What happened with your other house? Couldn’t it be rebuilt?’
‘It was completely destroyed but I couldn’t have gone on living there even if it hadn’t.’
‘I suppose not.’
‘You don’t feel like that about Western Isle?’
‘Alistair loved it. He didn’t die there, he died to keep it alive if you see what I mean.’
‘Susan loves it. I’m going to buy her a pony.’
‘You’ll spoil her.’
‘I want to give her everything I can. She’s all there is left of him.’
Annie looked at Blake, leaning back against the Aga rail. He hadn’t even kissed her when they became engaged, only in church just very briefly. There had been nothing. She wondered if he was thinking about Irene, missing her.
‘What was your first wedding day like?’
He smiled.
‘We didn’t have any money. I was a pitman then. I felt so awful, I couldn’t give Irene anything. We had a tiny little house which went with my job and she’d been so well off, she’d had everything, maids, clothes, no work to do. She ended up as a pitman’s wife. She was very good at it eventually.’
‘She didn’t care about being poor?’
‘Oh, I think she cared about it but we were young and . . . it didn’t matter in the end.’
‘Alistair’s father got drunk on our wedding day. Tommy and Clara quarrelled and there was a huge snowstorm. We were meant to go to Blackpool. We never got there. We were snowed in at Sunniside all week. That kettle’s boiling.’
There was an old silver teapot set out on a tray with sugar bowl and milk jug. Annie found the tea caddy and Blake got the milk out of the fridge and she remembered making tea for Alistair and herself rather in the same way because there had been nothing to do and it was so difficult.
Blake carried the tray through into the small sitting-room, Annie had rejected the idea of sitting in the drawing-room, it was so big for two of them.
‘Do we have to buy another house?’ she said, as they sat down.
Blake looked surprised.
‘I thought you’d want your own house.’
‘Do we have to decide?’
‘No, I don’t think so. I think Sylvester and Hetty would prefer to have us and more especially the children here.’
‘It’s not exactly cramped,’ Annie said.
‘If you change your mind let me know.’
* * *
They did have champagne in the evening and put on soft music, Mozart, and they sat in the dark by the log fire with a lighted candle or two. It made Annie think of being small when the farm had no electricity and they had candles in the bedrooms. They lay on the big sofa and Blake put his arms around her and drew her back against him. It was a long time since Annie had spent such a peaceful evening with a man. When he kissed her she turned her face towards him and then she waited for the way that it had been when other men had kissed her after Alistair died. She waited for that awful disappointment, she set herself not to draw back because they were married now and she had not made things easy for him but it was not like that and neither was it the kiss she had been waiting for all that time and she was amazed and horrified because it made her feel over-eager and desperate. She didn’t want him to know, she drew back and was confused. She wanted to laugh and cry and be glad but she couldn’t, it seemed such a betrayal to both of them. He stopped and let go of her. The logs fell apart in the grate, the music was suddenly all wrong. Annie made an excuse and fled. She couldn’t go back, her courage failed her. She went upstairs to her bedroom and stood by the window.
Blake followed her upstairs.
‘Aren’t you coming down again?’ he said from the doorway.
Annie turned around.
‘Don’t you want to take me to bed?’
‘Ever since I was fourteen. Have I done something wrong, I mean besides all the rest?’
‘You haven’t done anything wrong. I hate this dress, it doesn’t suit me. I wish I hadn’t worn it.’
Annie looked at him standing there in his expensive suit with a gold watch on his wrist which must have cost a fortune. She had never felt so poor or so stupid.
‘Don’t worry about the dress. You’re just tired.’
‘Getting married is tiring. I swore I wouldn’t do it again,’ Annie said, trying to smile and not quite managing.
‘Look, why don’t you get changed and I’ll come back—’
‘No.’ Annie knew that she couldn’t go through this again. In her haste to get rid of the awful dress she took it off swiftly, rolled it into a ball and threw it into the corner of the room. And then she felt so vulnerable standing there in her underclothes sure that she had made a terrible mistake. What was she doing here with a man she barely knew any more? She fastened her arms across her front and tried not to let the feelings overwhelm her. He was not Alistair, he was never going to be Alistair, he didn’t even kiss like Alistair any more and she had kept telling herself that he would, that he would feel and taste and be just like Alistair but he wouldn’t, she knew that already. He even smelled expensive, of good clothes and the kind of soap you bought in boxes that was shaped like lemons. His hands were fine with neatly cut nails and his hair was well-cut and so clean and shiny. Annie couldn’t find anything left of what he had been.
He said her name and took a step towards her and she backed into the dressing-table which was just behind her and knocked over all the little bottles of perfume and nail varnish and face cream which had been provided for her. The noise seemed magnified a hundred times in the silence.
She hadn’t noticed before how modern the room was. Alistair would have loathed it, the furniture was all sharp and angled and colourless and the bed – the bed was enormous. There were white covers on it, so white they almost hurt her eyes. Annie had never before wished to be back in that awful little house in the side street in Stanhope but she did now. She had never been in a bedroom like this with anybody other than her husband and she had never before been aware of how little like Alistair he was. He didn’t look anything like him, he wasn’t gentle and sensitive like Alistair. How could he have been after all he had gone through? Even the blue-grey gaze was not the same, there was something cool about it that frightened her. There was nothing of the boy left, nothing at all, he was a man now, rich and confident. He had hundreds of men working for him. She had missed the part of his life that had changed him from the boy who had loved her so much to this.
She felt as though he had bought her. She could not let him buy her jewellery or clothes or anything that would make her feel even more like something he owned. It didn’t make any difference now when he put very gentle hands on her. All she wanted to do was run away.
Before now it had seemed to Annie very often that Alistair was not dead at all, that she belonged to him still, that she did not want to love anyone else because it would be a betrayal and that as long as she did not get close to anyone else they would always belong to one another. He could never betray her and she still felt married to him. After all there had been no fight, there had been no separation, no reason for him to leave her. It was all unfinished business with them. She felt that he had walked out halfway through their life. Sometimes when she saw people on the street she was convinced she saw him. Things were not over between them, they had a child, there must be some kind of a future for them.
Blake picked her up and carried her over to the bed and put her down there and he was so careful and so gentle that Annie’s starving body clamoured for him. The bed was high and firm, nothing like the feather mattress she was used to. The room seemed to her big enough to lose half a dozen people. It didn’t feel like anything to do with her. She felt as though she had been picked up off the street for use. The soft glow from the bedside lights seemed to mock her cheap pretty underwear. She felt like a rabbit caught in car headlamps. Under his hands and mouth her body began to ache and give and respond. And he knew, just by having been married for a number of years, how to take her clothes off her, how to undress a woman deftly, how to touch her and kiss her and what she wanted him to do to her. He knew too much, Annie thought savagely, some woman had taught him carefully and well how to do this. And she was so screamingly ragingly hungry. He peeled off his clothes and he held her against the warmth of him and his body began to satisfy the dreadful aching. Annie closed her eyes as she gave herself to him. It was in a way the nearest thing to somebody wiping a blackboard or painting a house or destroying a building. It was the devastation of her marriage to Alistair Vane, the complete annihilation of it. There was nothing casual or fumbling or inept about what he did to her and her body was completely out of control wanting more and more and clinging and eager and so grateful. Annie hated herself. She hated the person that had done this. She imagined that he ran his life like this, taking what he wanted, completely in control, so thorough, so clever, so good.
When he finally let go of her she didn’t move for what felt like a long time but wasn’t and then she turned over away from him and tried to find a cool place on the bed. In the silence she crept under the covers as far away from him as she could without falling out of bed. She closed her eyes. She couldn’t think any more, she was exhausted.
* * *
Blake waited until she fell asleep and then he pulled on his clothes and went downstairs and opened the french windows which led into the garden. The night was freezing and clear and well-starred and his sharp mind gave him back in intimate detail each moment of his first wedding night just like a cinema reel, the shabby little house, the tiny bedroom, Irene laughing, the warmth, the cuddling, the whispers, the little moans of pleasure which she couldn’t silence but should have because of the neighbours, her body generous and sweet, pressing herself into his hands. He didn’t understand what he was doing any more, he didn’t know anything. He had tried to get things right but it wasn’t any good and tonight had confirmed his suspicions. Annie’s response was only hunger, there was no love. She had married him because he could keep her and her child. She would give him her body and he would pay, like some terrible illicit arrangement.