If only it was as easy to hold on to money as it was to make it in the first place, he worried. Where it went, he didn’t rightly know. Slipped through Margot’s fingers like water it did. And as for that son of his ...
George said, ‘Will you be building a new boat this year, Mr Clermont-Read?’
Edward almost snapped his reply. ‘Isn’t the
Faith
good enough for you then?’
The chauffeur-engineer’s usually placid face looked stricken and he rubbed his hands on his overalls in an agitated fashion. ‘Oh, yes, of course, sir. I wasn’t meaning to imply she wasn’t. It’s only that Master Bertie said something to me the other day about a design he’d been working on.’
‘Bertie’s a dreamer.’
‘Looked quite good to me, as a matter of fact, sir,’ George said, keeping his tone conciliatory, all too clearly showing his awareness that he needed to tread softly over this father-and-son issue. ‘Has an end fire boiler, so it would be easier to shovel. I’ve seen others like that, gives the boat a better turn of speed.’ He gave an indulgent smile. ‘Course, Master Bertie is more interested in the idea of a petrol-driven engine. Very forward-thinking, he is. Give me steam any day though, I told him.’
‘He’s a useless lump who only knows how to spend money without working for it!’
George wished, not for the first time, that he’d kept his mouth shut.
‘Mr Clermont-Read?’
‘What is it, dammit?’ Edward swung round, surprised to find Lily at his elbow.
‘I wondered if I could have a word?’
‘Now?’
‘In private.’
Edward looked as his filthy hands, at his boat, and at the way George so carefully avoided eye contact, and sighed. ‘Aye, well, happen we could do with a rest.’ He reached for a rag and started to clean the oil off his hands. ‘Go and get yourself a cup of tea, man.’
George wasted no time in snatching the opportunity to enjoy a bit of warmth in the kitchen, and a crack with Mrs Greenholme. She might have made some of her delicious scones, if he was lucky.
When the man had gone, Edward turned to Lily, his voice still tetchy. ‘Well, what is it? I haven’t all day, as you can see.’
She cleared her throat, not quite knowing where to begin now she was standing before him. ‘It’s about The Cobbles. I’ve been thinking a lot about it lately.’
‘Oh? Wanting to go back there, are you?’
‘Heavens, no, never that. My parents weren’t always so poor,’ she burst out, anxious suddenly to have this made plain. ‘Once upon a time me dad did well with the fishing. We had money to spend, and The Cobbles wasn’t such a bad place to be then. Dad didn’t have to work all the time in those days. He used to tek us bairns out in t’country. We’d make daisy chains, and dam streams and have picnics.’ She smiled at the memory. ‘He was allus a kindly, caring man. But then the fishing started to die and everything changed. Things started to go downhill and The Cobbles with them. My family weren’t the only ones to suffer.’
‘Well, I can’t be responsible for putting more fish in the lake.’ Irritated, Edward picked up his varnish brush and turned back to his beloved boat. He really had neither the time nor patience to listen to Lily’s moans. Hadn’t he enough with Margot these days?
‘We used to buy new clothes and have plenty of good food on our table,’ Lily persisted. ‘Now there are few jobs, a poor future and The Cobbles is a mess. It’s no wonder it’s rife with disease.’
Edward gazed at her, scowling in fury. ‘Are you trying to put the blame for Bertie’s diphtheria and your sister’s death on my shoulders? Is that what this is all about?’
Lily very nearly quailed before the fury in his gaze. Yet this was the man whose boat had run Dick down. Who’d refused to help repair their cottage and a dozen others like it, then sent his ferret of an agent round fast enough when they were behind with the rent. Therefore this was the man on whom she needed to take her revenge, not Bertie, not even Margot, for all the woman drove her mad. And she meant to do it, no matter what it cost her. Lily picked up a cloth and applied a dab of varnish to the boat’s scuffed woodwork. Edward watched her, surprise on his face. He didn’t interrupt when she started to speak.
‘I warrant you haven’t set foot in The Cobbles for years. If ever. I reckon it’s long past time you did.’
You’d have thought she’d asked him to visit the moon, judging by the expression of shock on his face. ‘You wish me to visit The Cobbles?’
‘I reckon it’s your duty.’
For a long, awe-filled moment silence stretched between them and Lily wanted very much to turn tail and run from his furious gaze. But she held her ground, turning all her attention to applying the varnish, even if it was going all over her hands.
Then, to her complete surprise, Edward threw down his own brush and let out a shout of laughter.
‘By Gad, you’re a rare one, Lily Thorpe. Never give up, do you?’
Lily suppressed a smile. ‘Not that I’ve noticed.’
‘You’ve not managed to get our Bertie working though, have you?’
‘Not yet.’
‘Happen that’s not your fault. I know you tried. You’ve at least managed to make him a touch more human.’ There was a pause while he nibbled at his moustache. ‘All right, you’re on. I’ll visit your damned Cobbles, and prove to you that I am not responsible for its state. That lies squarely with its inhabitants.’
On the day they’d chosen for the visit, it was raining. The rain came down from the grey mountains, swept across the lake in a thick cloud, hammered against the old boathouses, rushed up Fisher’s Brow and battered every roof in the district known as The Cobbles as sharply as stair-rods, which was what the locals dubbed this heavy and relentless type of rain. They knew too that it would continue all day long, soaking people and houses with impunity, flooding gutters and leaving no part of the area dry. It was the worst possible day for Lily to prove her case, as it provided Edward with the perfect excuse to blame everything wrong in The Cobbles upon the weather.
Yet for all the damp discomfort the streets were still full of people, hurrying to their work or to the shops, going about their business as best they may. Washing still hung from lines, and would remain there for days since there was nowhere else to put it. Bare-footed children splashed in puddles and, as the two of them made their way down Drake Road, a man came out of a back kitchen and urinated against the wall of his cottage.
‘There you are. Doesn’t that prove my point?’ Edward stormed, appalled by such vulgar behaviour.
Lily pushed a lock of wet hair back from her brow. ‘Do you own all the houses in this street?’
‘I do.’
‘Do they all have privies?’ She smiled when she saw Edward scowl. ‘Quite. So if the single privy shared between six, ten, or more houses is usually occupied, can you blame him?’
Edward only glowered in silence. As they walked up and down the various streets and alleys, Lily pointed out other problems. The missing slates on roofs, the lack of proper guttering, the fact that many of the streets were little more than dirt tracks. ‘Where children play, mind, despite what you saw that man do.’
Edward again protested his innocence but as Lily marched him in through the back door of one hovel after another, leading him through insanitary sculleries, grim kitchens, bedrooms where black fungi grew upon the walls and ceilings hung broken and untended, his protests faded away and he grew increasingly horrified. Why had he not been informed of the true state of this place? Wasn’t this the responsibility of his agent, Percy Wright? What was the man doing? Yet in his heart Edward knew the responsibility lay with himself, and himself alone. He’d never checked, had he?
Lily was saying, ‘As I understand it, The Cobbles formed the original Carreckwater. Once the rest of the village was built, given a new name and later developed, this area became more and more neglected.’
The very reason why, of course, Edward had managed to buy it so cheaply. As an investment, he’d thought. Now he could see it was very far from that.
‘Me dad says that them who has the vote, has the power. So things should start to change now Asquith has brought in the Franchise Bill. With votes for all men over twenty-one, the landlords won’t have the power they once had. Which everyone knows was too much.’
Edward’s face grew tight. He’d been against such liberal open-mindedness and hated now to be put in the wrong, though this girl was making a fine job of cornering him nicely in his own mess. He adopted his most pompous tone. ‘Allow me to explain that that is the way of the world, the way it is meant to be. Certainly the way life has developed over the centuries. There are those who rule and those who serve.’
‘Happen it shouldn’t be that way,’ Lily replied with spirit. ‘For one set of folk to look down upon another set just because they have more money, happen that’s wrong. And equally wrong that the poor are considered unimportant, that other folk believe nothing need be done to make their lives better, just because they don’t vote.’
Struggling to hold on to his patience, Edward attempted to explain. ‘We English, unlike the Scots, Welsh and Irish, have little in the way of folk customs and the like. Therefore we make more of class. Quite rightly, in my opinion, since it’s folk like me, wi’ a bit of class like, who drive the engine of this country, like a big boat on the lake. But it’s open to all to change their lot in life. If you’re not born with it, you must work hard to raise the means to purchase it, as I did, else sink into squalor as your family have.’
Lily flinched, and, sidetracked by some warped logic in his argument, began to doubt for the first time her ability to succeed in her quest. Why should he help them? He must know she wanted to make his life difficult simply out of revenge. He could just as easily burn The Cobbles to the ground and make his money elsewhere. She could think of no reply.
‘It’s good to see you care, Lily,’ he said, magnanimous in his victory. ‘But if these people don’t like it here, they can always move out.’
‘You mean, they can either stay and die of disease, or leave and be homeless and die of starvation?’ Lily watched with interest as his discomfort returned and with it a pronounced tetchiness.
‘It’s important to be successful. To have an aim in life.’ Edward was desperately struggling to hold on to his theory of economics, rather than dwell on the scene before his eyes. Better that than observe a small toddler crawling through the filth of this rain-soaked back yard, following its mother who’d run to fetch a bucket or two of water from a tap at the end of the street. Edward shuddered with revulsion at the prospect of living such a life.
Lily captured the wailing infant and carried it safely back into the house.
‘It’s all right Lucy,’ she told the worried mother who quickly returned, splashing water recklessly from her two buckets in her haste. ‘I’ve put him safe under the table.’
‘Thanks, Lil.’
Edward refused to meet her eyes as they left the yard. He took refuge in lighting a cigar, clamping it furiously in his mouth and visibly relaxing as he drew in the welcome fragrance of it. ‘We landlords, the well-to-do if you like, must be in control, because we have the power and the money. We’re the ones with the education, the intelligence, and the skills.’
‘Have you never considered that the poor might just have a touch of intelligence themselves?’ Lily mildly enquired. ‘Might even welcome a bit more schooling, given the chance. Particularly in a lovely spot like the Lakes with its growing tourism. Why should poor folk put up with squalor? Why can’t their skills be improved?’
‘You can’t blame all the ills of the country on me,’ Edward barked, hating the feel of the rain running down his neck, soaking him through. Hating being put in the wrong and wanting only to get this dreadful visit over with and return to his warm, dry, pleasant home. ‘It’s my duty to take my place in running the country, and the Empire, at whatever cost. But I can’t be responsible for every miserable soul who lives in it.’
Lily stopped and looked up at him. ‘Can you not?’
‘No. But there’s no shame in ruling, or in trying to improve oneself and move up in the world, Lily. It gives a man pride.’
‘You mean a self-righteous sense of superiority?’
He made a noise of derision, deep in his throat. ‘Margot’s right. You’re far too egalitarian for comfort, lass.’
‘Aye,’ she said stoutly, this time unconcerned by the word. ‘Happen I am. Praise the Lord. Or, worse, a Liberal, eh?’ She laughed. ‘I remember celebrating Empire Day in school along with the rest of ‘em. Dressed up in a sari, or pretending to be a native in a grass skirt.’
She stood facing him in the back street, close by the very ash-pit roof where she and Dick had kissed and dreamed of escape, of building a good future together, of doing exactly as Edward Clermont-Read now suggested - going up in the world. Would they then have become leaders and rulers as heartless and uncaring as he? She sincerely hoped not, even if they had managed to reach such dizzy heights. Lily felt annoyed by Edward’s arrogance, his assumption that he must always be in the right. She drew in a deep breath and fought on as never before. He owed her, didn’t he?
‘I know naught about the rights and wrongs of such things as Empire. Happen folk don’t want to be ruled, nor told what to do all the time, while naught is done to improve their lot.’