For The Sake of Her Family (37 page)

Suddenly she heard the front door slam and the sound of Gerald’s voice laughing and booming as he ran up the stairs. But he was not alone; there was an answering peal of high-pitched
laughter, and then the sound of a woman talking in a foreign language that Alice couldn’t understand. She froze as she listened to them frolicking on the landing, the shrieks and laughter
getting louder as they went into Gerald’s bedroom and closed the door behind them.

Alice stared out at the pouring rain. How dare he bring one of his whores into the bed he’d shared with her? Her temper started building as she heard the giggles from the adjoining room
and imagined Gerald muttering words of love. She looked at the baby playing contentedly and decided to walk in on the loving couple. Gathering her skirts and jutting out her chin, she marched out
onto the landing and threw open the bedroom door.

‘What the blazes! How dare you enter my bedroom!’ Gerald looked out from the bed, eyes blazing with anger. ‘Get out! Get out now!’

‘Who is this, Gerald?’ The dark-haired woman gave Alice a disdainful look.

‘She’s nothing, Tatiana, just a servant who doesn’t know her place.’

‘Surely no maid would be so bold as to enter your room when they know you are busy?’

Gerald leapt up from the bed, pulling his braces up and buttoning his flies, as Alice looked at the Russian beauty who had taken her place. Or rather, whose place she had taken, for this was the
woman he’d always been in love with, while Alice had never been more than a plaything to him.

‘Get rid of her!’ commanded Tatiana, her foreign accent making the words sound even more contemptuous. ‘I don’t want a maid who’s so rude to her mistress.
She’s obviously not been trained well.’

Alice protested, ‘Tell her, Gerald – tell her I’m more than a maid, that we were to be married. Tell her.’

His face as black as thunder, Gerald pushed her out of the door, then slapped her hard across the face. Grabbing her arm, he forced her into the nursery and picked up the innocent Baby Alice
under his other arm, making her scream in shock and surprise. The cries of Alice and the baby echoed through the manor as he stormed down the stairs dragging them with him. He released
Alice’s arm just long enough to open the front door, then threw her down the steps and set the baby on the ground. As Alice crawled, sobbing, to shelter the baby from the rain, her blonde
hair lank and wet, he stood in the front doorway looking down on them.

‘Get away from here. You’re nothing but a common whore. And you can take the brat with you. I don’t want to see you or it ever again – you are both mistakes.’ His
white shirt clung to his chest as he bellowed the words that cut through the air and into Alice’s heart. ‘Go on, get off my property before I set the dogs on you.’

Alice stood in the pouring rain, holding the crying baby. She could see there was no love in his heart for them, not a scrap of affection. He glared at her, as if waiting for her to plead, but
she wasn’t going to beg; she’d never begged for anything. Her tears mingling with the cold rain, she turned and walked away, Baby Alice screaming in her arms. She had her dignity, if
nothing else. As for Gerald – good riddance; he wasn’t worth it. If that was a gentleman, then Old Nick himself had better manners.

The rain fell like stair rods, cold and biting, while Alice clung to the shivering baby, trying to shield her from the rain with her body. Her heart felt heavy and tears stung her eyes as she
set off down the road, walking without knowing where she was going. With all the strength in her little arms and legs, Baby Alice fought against her guardian, still screaming at the top of her
lungs.

On and on Alice walked, into the village of Dent, past the closed doors of the Moon, past the Battys’ yard, with the coffins still propped against the walls, and on past the fountain where
she’d flirted with Jack. There was no door where she could find sanctuary, no one she could turn to with the little bundle that now lay quiet in her arms, too exhausted to struggle. She was a
stranger in her own village. Remembering all the past hurts, a wave of desperation swept over her.

By the time she got to the church bridge that spanned the beer-coloured waters of the River Dee, the baby’s body felt cold and limp in her arms. She stood on the parapet, looking down at
the white foam swirling round the willow roots and crashing over boulders as the floodwaters swept down the valley to the sea. Her long blonde hair dripped onto the wet, frozen body of Baby Alice
as she bent her head over her.

‘Forgive me,’ she whispered, kissing the baby tenderly on the forehead. Then she clambered to the top of the bridge, clutching Baby Alice to her chest. Tears filled her eyes and she
was trembling as she looked down into the gushing waters.

‘Oh, no, you don’t. I can’t let you do that.’ A strong voice came from nowhere and an arm clasped her around the waist, preventing her from leaping into the pounding
waters. ‘I’ll not have your death on my conscience.’ The strong arm pulled them both back from the edge and deposited them by the roadside.

Jack stood over Alice and the baby as they huddled together, a picture of despair. Tenderly he bent down and picked up both frozen bodies in his strong arms and carried them to his waiting
trap.

As he lifted her in, Alice put her arm around him. It was Jack, the one she had hurt so badly, the one who had every right to turn his back on her. She cried into his soaked jacket and looked
desperately into his eyes as he laid her underneath a horse blanket, wrapping Baby Alice up next to her.

‘Right, you’re coming home to Dale End where you belong, with me.’

For once, Alice did not argue. She wanted so much to belong. Perhaps life was going to be all right, now she finally knew her place.

November 1918

The sky was heavy with snow, and the biting wind made Alice’s cheeks glow red as she sat behind the fell wall watching the lights go on down the dale. No lights were
visible at the manor; it was in darkness, empty and cold like Gerald’s heart. He was long gone. Taking Tatiana with him, he’d fled the dale in the middle of the night, bankrupt and in
disgrace, with creditors lining up from Dent to Kendal. Rumour had it that he’d left the country.

The two loyal servants he had abandoned to their fate were now doing very nicely for themselves. Mr Faulks had wasted no time in asking Mrs Dowbiggin for her hand in marriage, and the pair of
them were now running a successful tea room in Sedbergh. Alice was glad they would have security in their old age. Although they still argued like cat and dog, they couldn’t live without one
another.

Wrapping her shawl around her against the cold, she smiled as she watched Jack and little Alice in the yard down at Dale End. Jack was feeding the dogs and the little girl was helping collect
the eggs from the hen house, holding her skirt up to carry them into the house, just the way Alice herself used to do when she was a child. Daintily carrying the eggs across the yard with the help
of her dad. Dad – how easily that rolled off the tongue; but that was what Jack had become and young Alice knew no different. She didn’t remember the night that they’d been thrown
out of the manor in the pouring rain, and Jack had found them and taken them home with him to Dale End. There they had stayed, loved and content, in the cottage that had been Alice’s
childhood home.

Alice watched as Jack lit the oil lamp in the window; time to wander down and make the evening meal and sit contented next to the fire. Her finger played with the wedding ring that Jack had so
lovingly put on her finger last New Year’s Day. How she loved him, and he her. Young love was foolish; she knew that now. All the time she’d been searching, he’d been there, under
her nose, with everything she ever wanted. What a fool she had been, her head turned by everything false, when she’d had the love of a good man all along. Her hands rested on the bulge of her
unborn baby; soon their family would be complete, a little brother or sister for Alice. A new life to nurture and care for in the family home.

Getting to her feet, Alice carefully picked her way down the path, the first snowflake of winter slowly melting on her face. Perhaps they would build a snowman tomorrow, or perhaps the little
family would just keep warm indoors and watch through their window as the dale turned into a winter wonderland. Whatever they did, they would do it with love, the two Alices safe and secure with a
good, strong, loving man by their side. A Dales man, one of few words but every one of them true, and with a love so strong that she knew they would take on the world together, for ever.

Dentdale lies in the Yorkshire Dales surrounded by beautiful rolling fells. Until recently, access to this remote area was difficult. It is the place where generations of my
family hail from, and the place I call home.

Some of the things mentioned in my story have factual roots, and I thought that you, the reader, would be interested to know them.

Whernside Manor was originally known as West House. It was owned by the Sill family, who made their fortune from West Indian sugar and built the manor with the proceeds. They also brought slaves
to Dent, and there are some who say that those slaves built the limestone walls that are a feature of the dale. It is rumoured that Emily Brontë, who along with her sisters went to school with
the Sills in nearby Cowan Bridge, based Heathcliff in
Wuthering Heights
on stories she’d been told of life at Whernside Manor.

Dent marble is a black crinoidal limestone, much sought after for its fossil remains. It is mostly deposited around the rocks of Arten Gill, and its presence led to a boom in quarrying and works
in the Dentdale area. The main works were located at Stone House, which was famed for its beautifully polished fireplaces. By the mid-nineteenth century, Stone House products were being exported
worldwide, including a superb fireplace that was shipped to the Tsar of Russia in St Petersburg. Later, however, cheaper Italian marble began flooding the market and Stone House was forced to
close.

The impressive granite fountain near the entrance to St Andrew’s church was built to commemorate Dentdale’s most famous resident, vicar’s son Adam Sedgwick (1785–1873).
Educated at Sedbergh School and Cambridge University, he went on to become Woodwardian Professor of Geology at Cambridge. He was a close friend of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, and also taught
the young Charles Darwin.

First published 2012 by Macmillan

This electronic edition published 2012 by Macmillan
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ISBN 978-0-230-76610-5 EPUB

Copyright © Diane Allen 2012

The right of Diane Allen to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

This is a work of fiction. The people, places, events, circumstances and institutions
depicted are fictitious and the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance of
any character to any actual person, whether living or dead, is purely coincidental.

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