Gates of Paradise (34 page)

‘We'd given you up for lost,' Mrs Beke said in her acid way. ‘Where have you been, if I may make so bold as to ask?'

He told her briefly and without any emotion, for by now the news hung about his heart like the heaviest of Mr Cosens' millstones. And like all the other people he'd talked to that morning, they wanted to know what he was going to do. The answer was engraved on the millstone. ‘I shall go to London,' he said. ‘I can't have my family turned out on my account, an' Heaven knows there's little to keep me here. I shall go to London and make my fortune.'

‘Good luck to 'ee, then,' Mr Hosier said. ‘Tha's what I says. When d'you have to go?'

It was the one thing Johnnie hadn't thought to ask, and the first thing he
did
ask when he saw his mother that afternoon. Her answer came as a shock that stopped his breath.

‘Tomorrow mornin',' she said. ‘They give me the ticket. See. Here 'tis. Tomorrow mornin' on the first stage.'

So soon, he thought, taking the ticket. So quick. There was barely time to digest what had happened or to think what he would do when he arrived. But his mind was made up to it, quick or not. He'd been the one who'd urged revolution and organised that meeting and pressed his neighbours to stand up for the right. He'd felt like a god standing there in that courtroom, fighting back and answering up, and now there was a price to pay for it.

‘If you go I shall never see you again,' his mother wept. ‘We can't let you do this, Johnnie.'

‘I'll come an' see you whenever I can,' he promised. ‘It could be the makin' a' me. Think a' that. Off to London. I could make my fortune there.'

But she wept and wouldn't be comforted and in the end he had to leave her red-eyed and head back to Turret House to tell Mrs Beke he would be leaving his job at first light the next morning.

The announcement caused a stir, for like him they hadn't imagined he would have to go so soon, but they wished him luck and hoped he would find a good job and Mrs Beke told him she wouldn't go into details when she told Mr Hayley in case he wanted to argue about it, ‘which would make matters worse for your poor mother, would it not? You know how he goes on when he means to do good. Like a bull in a china shop. I shall tell him
you've a good job offered and that I've urged you to take it, so I hope you'll prove me right. You must write to us and tell us how you get on.'

Then there was nothing more to be done except tell his mother, finish his work and wrap his few belongings in a piece of sailcloth that Mr Hosier found for him. Not that there was much to wrap. Gardeners don't run to many possessions.

His mother wept all over again and said he was a dear good boy, the best a mother could wish for. While she was crying his father came home and was told the news too and he went off to his bedroom and returned with a small leather pouch.

‘Oi been keepin' this for a weddin' present,' he said, ‘but tha's gone by the board now Oi s'ppose.'

‘That went by the board a long time since,' Johnnie admitted, surprised by how calmly he was speaking. ‘We 'aven't been walkin' out for months.' And now they never would again. But he was calm about that, too.

‘In that case,' his father said, ‘you'd best have this now. 'Twill buy you lodgin's an' vittles an' such until you gets settled.' He put the pouch into his son's hands.

It contained two silver sixpences and a gold sovereign and the sight of them moved Johnnie so much he couldn't trust himself to speak. To have saved such a sum when he was so poorly paid was miraculous – and more generous than he deserved. ‘Oh Pa!' he said.

Hiram was gruff with unshed tears too. ‘Don't
thank me,' he said. ‘Tha's little enough in all conscience. Oi wish Oi could do more for 'ee.'

At which Johnnie threw his arms round his father's neck and wept for quite a while.

When they were both recovered, they made plans for the next morning. ‘We'll walk with 'ee part way,' Hiram said. ‘See you off loike.' Which they did.

It was very cold out there in the fields and very dark for the sun was only just beginning to rise and apart from a few pale green streaks in the east, the earth and the sky were black. The family trudged along in silence with Annie clinging to her son's arm and Harry rubbing the sleep from his eyes when he thought his father wasn't looking. And if Johnnie shivered from time to time, that was only to be expected on such a raw morning.

When they'd been walking for a mile or so, they reached a bend in the lane and Hiram stopped. ‘This is as far as we goes,' he said to Johnnie. ‘You got enough light now.' Which wasn't quite true for, although the sky was laced with spreading colour, the downs were still as black as ink and the distant spire of the cathedral was little more than a ghostly shadow. ‘You'll write to us. Oi knows we can't read much but Oi daresay we shall make out, an' Mr Grinder will read what we can't manage.'

Johnnie was shivering in earnest now. He promised to write, kissed them all, over and over again, and let his mother cling about his neck for as long as she wanted, but the parting had to be made
for all that. It was like being wrenched apart with hot irons and the pain of it was so acute it was an agony to walk away. He turned to wave again and again until he had rounded the bend and they were out of sight. And then he was miserably on his own in the darkness.

Hiram took Harry's hand and held it firm. ‘Don't 'ee ever forget,' he said angrily, ‘that this is what comes a' speaking out against a landlord. When you're a grow'd man with a wife an' family to support, you just remember it. There's onny one defence against the rich an' tha's to keep your mouth tight shut an' never say nothin' to annoy 'em. Never, ever forget.'

Harry was shivering now. ‘No, Father,' he said, solemnly.

‘You promise?'

‘Yes, Father. I promise.'

‘Well tha's all roight then,' Hiram said. ‘Now we'd best be gettin' back.'

As Johnnie walked on, the sun rose slowly and the ploughed earth began to steam. The dawn chorus began, with a single blackbird piping alone and plaintive in the darkness. And gradually the countryside was unveiled and the mists rolled away and after a while he could see the huddled shapes of a flock of sheep, gathered together under the bare branches of a spreading oak tree, folded into breathing bundles and still half asleep and he watched as they knelt to stand, one after the other, and began to graze. The sky lightened with every
step he took, the grass grew green, and the anguish of walking through this familiar landscape for the last time made his chest ache. This is my home, he thought. This is where I belong and where I ought to stay. But the sun was a red disc in a pale green sky and Chichester was waiting on the horizon and every step took him nearer to the new life he'd been pretending to accept and the fortune-making adventure he didn't want.

When he finally reached Lavant, he'd made such poor time that the London coach was already waiting in the courtyard and many of the passengers were on board. There were two women climbing into the coach as he approached, one very fat and the other very thin and both carrying enormous baskets covered in cloths and tied about with string; and four men settling themselves in the outside seats with a great deal of fuss and laughter and their brandy flasks at the ready; and an old countrywoman wearing a brown blanket like a shawl over her head and shoulders and sitting very still in one corner. Poor old thing.

He climbed aloft and took the last remaining seat, which was next to the old woman, packed his bundle neatly underneath the slats and wished he'd brought a flask to sustain him on the journey. And then the chocks were being removed, the horn was sounding and they were off. And the old woman turned her head towards him and she was Betsy Haynes.

The shock of seeing her there beside him was so
profound he could barely breathe. ‘Betsy?' he said. ‘What are you doin' here?'

She smiled at him and slipped her hand from underneath that blanket shawl so that she could hold his arm. ‘You surely don't imagine I'd let 'ee go all the way to London on your own,' she said. ‘What next? I'm a-comin' with 'ee.'

He was so happy he wanted to jump up and down. She was coming with him. His own dear darling Betsy was coming with him.

She gave him the benefit of her blue eyes, sitting there in that icy morning, smiling and happy. ‘You'll have to marry me, though.'

‘Oh yes, yes, a' course,' he said, and he bent his head to kiss her, to the delight of their fellow passengers who chirruped and whistled and asked him if that was the way he always went on and said he was a dog ‘damn their eyes if he wasn't.' But he didn't care about being teased. He didn't care about anything. He could kiss her whenever he wanted to. ‘Oh, my dear darling Betsy,' he said. ‘I never thought to see you again an' here you are. How did you know I'd be on this coach? An' why aren't you wearin' your cardinal?'

‘I sold it to buy my ticket,' she said, ‘an' don't make that face. I got a good price for it, an' Ma give me this to keep me warm. I shan't feel the lack.'

She was feeling the lack already for her hand was icy cold. He took it in both his and chafed it to warm it. ‘I'll buy you another one the first thing I do,' he promised.

‘I brought us a pie for the journey,' she told him. ‘I made it for ol' Miss Pearce but she can go without, an' serve her right, nasty spiteful ol' thing. 'Tis in the basket. An' there's a bottle a' porter an' some brandy an' water to keep us warm. We shall do very well.'

Oh, yes, Johnnie thought, as they sped along the London road. They would do very well.

Farmer Harry Boniface was in a very good humour that Saturday morning. It was his father's ninetieth birthday and although the old man was frail and deaf and toothless the family meant to celebrate it in style. The birthday feast was prepared, the table set and now it only wanted the guests for the festivities to begin. He was just climbing into the farm cart to go and fetch them, when the potboy trotted into the yard, breathless and urgent with a message from the publican to ask if he would be so kind as to take Mr Gilchrist into Chichester with him, if it wasn't too much trouble. He agreed cheerfully. That lawyer feller had been poking around the village quite long enough. High time he was off. Although, being a practical man, he did ask what had happened to the carriage.

‘The wheel come off,' the potboy explained. ‘What'll take all day to fix. An' Oi reckon this ol' pony's gone lame on me. Oi been kickin' loike billyoh an' he won't go more'n a trot.'

‘Don't look lame to me,' Harry said. ‘Bit disagreeable moind, but tha's hardly a surpoise if you been a-kickin' of him. Talk to him gentle an' he'll go loike the wind. Roight then, young feller
me-lad, you cut back an' tell Mr Gilchrist to be ready an' waitin' in twenty minutes an' he shall roide in with me.'

Mr Gilchrist was ready and waiting within two minutes of the potboy's return, and climbed up gratefully into the cart, with his carpetbag in one hand and a rolled umbrella in the other. ‘This is very civil of you, Mr Boniface,' he said.

‘We aims to please,' Harry said, amused to see how the lawyer's long hair was being blown by the wind and how pink in the face he was. For a second he felt quite sympathetic towards him. He was such a dreamy looking, moon-faced young man and couldn't have been more than twenty or so. ‘You had a good day yesterday, Oi'm told,' he said, and clucked to his horse to walk on.

‘I did indeed,' Mr Gilchrist said, as they headed off towards the church.

‘And found the answers to all your questions, Oi don't doubt,' Harry said, looking at him out of the corner of his eye. Now that the young man was leaving it suddenly seemed important to find out how much he knew. If he really was a writer and meant to make his findings public there could be trouble.

Mr Gilchrist was guarded. ‘To many of them, yes. The accounts of the trial were most interesting.'

‘Now there's a thing,' Harry said. ‘Oi never knew there was an account of it. Although Oi s'ppose, givin' thought to it, there must've been.'

‘Several,' Mr Gilchrist said. ‘None as full as I
would have liked but sufficient to give me some sense of what happened.'

‘He was found not guilty,' Harry said stoutly. ‘Tha's what happened an' a good thing too, to moi way a' thinking.'

‘I gather that was the opinion in the village at the time,' Mr Gilchrist said.

There was no harm in admitting it. ‘Aye, so it was. He was a good man.'

‘I also gather,' Mr Gilchrist went on, ‘that giving evidence on his behalf was a somewhat risky thing to do, given the preponderance of tied cottages hereabouts.'

‘Well as to that,' Harry said sternly, ‘I couldn't say.'

‘Nor will you,' Mr Gilchrist said, ‘and the more honour to you.'

‘You'll be glad to get back to Lunnon, Oi daresay,' Harry said.

‘Indeed, yes.'

‘We're in good toime for the coach.'

‘I hope I'm not taking you out of your way,' Mr Gilchrist said.

‘No, sir, you aren't,' Harry said happily. ‘Oi got business in Lavant moiself. Oi'd ha' come in anyway.'

The coach down from London arrived with horns blaring and harness jingling ten minutes after Mr Gilchrist's coach had trundled away. It was full of people, most of them in holiday mood, and eleven of them were Bonifaces, Johnnie and Betsy and their son Frederick and his wife and their two
daughters, and their pretty daughter Hannah and her husband and their three children. Johnnie was the first to jump down, looking very smart and prosperous in a new green jacket and twill trousers and a fine pair of leather boots, his grey hair bushy under the broad brim of his green top hat. He waved at Harry but then busied himself helping Frederick's wife and her two little girls to climb down. And there was Betsy climbing down after them, her wide skirts swinging like a bell, wearing a little blue jacket the colour of her eyes and the prettiest poke bonnet framing her grey hair and her plump face, rosy and smiling and calling out to him. It was a homecoming, as it always was when they came a-visiting.