Chapter 21
21
The following year offered with hope when, in the April of 1917, America entered the war, but there was still heartbreaking tragedy to be found in Olivia’s life. Major Turrell was shipped off to St Dunstan’s Lodge in Regent’s Park – an exciting new facility where blinded servicemen could learn how to adapt to life without sight – but died unexpectedly from an infection two weeks after leaving Norfolk. Even the seemingly no-nonsense nurse shed a tear when the news got back to Merriford.
As always, Olivia turned to her imagination to see her through. She wrote a short story about a romance between a blind soldier and the nurse who tended to him, knowing that the major was the man in her uplifting tale. What he had been robbed of in life, he would have on the page. Benji, who was the only one who really understood her need to indulge her creative soul, read it and told her it was ‘jolly dramatic and soppy enough for any woman’. He encouraged her to submit it to a competition in a ladies’ journal and, much to her surprise, she came first, entitling her to have her work published in the next edition.
Her mother had been correct: after the rain, the sun was sure to follow.
‘It’s suffocating, isn’t it? Grief?’ Lady Fairchild said to Olivia as they walked around the gardens, arms linked and looking for all the world like mother and daughter. Sir Hugo was away again overnight – the advent of war not curtailing his little trips to the coast.
‘I can hardly bear to look at the photograph on the sideboard that we had taken in Haven-on-Sea during your first summer,’ she continued. ‘How can two of those smiling faces have been taken from us? And now Howard is out there too.’
He’d been in France for seven months and no one suspected the newfound intimacy between him and Olivia, least of all his mother. It was to remain their secret until such time as she was certain of her feelings. She wrote to him regularly, and had sent out a picture taken on her eighteenth birthday, which he told her was kept tucked into the small pocketbook he carried.
‘I think back to when you arrived at the manor. I had no idea how to be a mother to you and was fully aware that Selina had raised you very differently to the way I raised my boys. She was so tactile and indulgent, whereas Sir Hugo insisted on firm discipline with our sons, and was adamant that excessive affection would weaken their character. I see now that you craved affection, space to breathe, and support in your creative endeavours.’
‘Don’t apologise. You were so kind to take me in and did your very best. By giving me the tower, you gave me all the space I needed. My mother would be so very grateful for everything you and Sir Hugo have done.’
‘I dearly hope so but I am not convinced. She was so different to me, and such a joyful soul. I remember when Jasper first introduced her to us and she insisted on looping her arm through mine, which I found somewhat… invasive. Now I see that it’s one of the best ways to truly connect with another.’
They stopped before a bed of red and yellow tulips and Olivia rested her head on the older woman’s shoulder. For all their undoubted love and strong sense of family, the Fairchilds had displayed very little physical affection until her arrival. If she had taught them anything in return for their kindness, let it be that.
‘If only I had put my arms about my boys more before they were snatched away from me.’ Cynthia’s voice started to crack.
‘They knew that you loved them. It was more than enough. Besides, Louis really wasn’t the embracing sort.’ They both smiled at that.
‘I could bear the pain of all this more if their bodies had been returned to me. Instead, they are buried hundreds of miles away. I have no graves to visit, nowhere I can lay flowers, and it feels so unreal, as though they aren’t dead at all.’
‘You can always talk to them,’ Olivia soothed. ‘They are both watching over you, even at this moment, and will listen to anything you have to say. I still find myself having conversations with my parents. I even wrote to them both after they’d died, imagining how they might respond.’
Lady Fairchild shook her head.
‘I wish I could open myself up to such fancies. I envy you that.’ She turned to her companion, planting a small kiss on the top of her head, and then Olivia tilted her face upwards and their eyes met.
‘I’m so proud of the young woman you have become. You’ve long been like a daughter, and I know Benji and Howard see you as a sister.’ Cynthia’s words confirmed she was blind to the truth of her son’s feelings. ‘When loved ones are taken from you, those who remain become so much more important.’
Olivia nodded mutely. The Fairchilds could never replace her parents, but they were her family now, even though Howard’s declaration of love had the potential to send all the apples in the cart flying into the air. The huge weight of carrying their secret was almost as dizzying as the kisses they’d shared by the boating lake, but the next time he came home for leave, she would know for sure what she truly felt and tell him as much.
* * *
Unhappily, Howard was not to return to the shores of his homeland for the whole of that year. In her frustration, Olivia threw herself into her writing and was met with moderate success. She had several further short stories published in ladies’ journals. The money, which she had no need of, she donated to the convalescent hospital – another activity that took her mind off her troubles.
She had long since decided that her volunteer work was just as valuable as becoming a qualified nurse, especially as she’d discovered that she wasn’t terribly good with blood. Besides, she couldn’t, in all conscience, leave Cynthia, even for the few weeks it would take to train. She did make friends with the nurses at Merriford, however, and one, in particular, shared her love of reading. The woman’s sweetheart was in the navy, so Olivia told her, in the strictest confidence, about Howard. She was relieved to finally speak about the conundrum out loud, and it gave them another thing in common.
Christmas 1917 was a muted affair for the family, for how could you celebrate with two Fairchild heirs dead, and a third stuck in waterlogged trenches abroad? It didn’t seem right to be feasting on goose, drinking sherry and playing parlour games when Howard was fighting for his life and their future. But for Benji’s sake, and to raise the spirits of the wounded men, all those at Merriford Manor made an effort. There was usually someone proficient enough on the piano to entertain his fellow patients, and that December, they had the benefit of a young man who had worked in the music halls before the war.
The new year was ushered in, as the newspapers reported on the alarming number of merchant vessels being sunk by U-boats – and the ensuing shortages meant that rationing was finally introduced. Sugar was the first item, but meat, butter and cheese followed soon afterwards. Sir Hugo bemoaned the absence of marmalade on the breakfast table, and the increased costs of postage and tobacco. But all Olivia could think of was Howard and how unfair it was that they had been kept apart. Her letters were daily – his sporadic. It was no way to conduct a romance.
In the March of 1918, the Fairchilds were sad to learn that Ernest Dunn had been killed, and Sir Hugo and his wife attended a memorial service for him in the village. Everyone felt particularly sorry for his mother, especially as the father had passed away the previous year with heart trouble. Olivia had not been close to him but it was yet another young life cruelly extinguished.
Howard had now been in France for a year and a half with no leave, but this was sadly not uncommon. All that time when he had not seen his family or been able to hold the girl he had professed to love since he was fourteen. The strain of the war was becoming increasingly apparent through his letters but Olivia had long been angry that someone so young had been asked to lead men older and more experienced than himself into battle. His anguish and despair seeped into every page, and she became desperately worried about his state of mind.
And then, out of the blue, he was granted ten days’ leave and she wondered if his obvious mental struggles had been apparent to his superiors and consequently a factor in this decision.
The nervous anticipation that Olivia felt over his impending visit was palpable. Would it be that their grand love affair was really not so grand after all? His declaration back in the autumn of 1916 had caught her off guard, and the remaining few hours they’d spent together had not been sufficient for her to establish anything with any certainty. And then not to have seen him for all that time – their letters simply hadn’t been enough. She’d never been in love with anyone outside of her imagination and only ever been kissed by him. Her childish infatuation with the gardener when she’d first arrived had been misguided in the extreme, and her attraction to the butcher’s son was just harmless flirtation. So how could she know if what she felt for Howard was real? She needed to be near him, to look in his eyes, feel his hands on her face, his lips on hers, to be certain.
When he landed back in the country, he telegraphed from London to say he would be at Merriford Lode station at ten past one on the Tuesday afternoon. Sir Hugo had planned to collect him in the motor car but it had been playing up all week, so Olivia offered to walk into the village and meet him. She was nervous that if they were to reunite in the presence of his parents, that her true feelings, whatever they proved to be, would be written across her face like the newspaper headlines on the sandwich boards in town. It’s Not Love After All! would be embarrassing for her, a shock to the Fairchilds and devastating for Howard.
‘We could all go?’ she suggested half-heartedly, knowing Lady Fairchild wasn’t really one for long walks and her husband had been having trouble with his knees recently. In the end, both were happy for her to go alone and she felt relieved that this long-anticipated reunion would not be witnessed by anyone else.
The day was warm, if gusty, and she changed into a pair of sturdy leather shoes and tied a pretty silk scarf, gifted from Cynthia, around her neck. The last thing she did before stepping away from her dressing table mirror was to pinch her cheeks and give her face a healthy, virginal glow. It only occurred to her as she set off down the long driveway, almost an hour before she needed to, that she would be a veritable beetroot by the time she arrived at the station, and she needn’t have pinched her cheeks at all. Thank goodness she was giving herself plenty of time and could compose herself before his train pulled into Merriford Lode.
Cowslips and primroses covered the banks as she walked alongside the open fields and into the village. The chatter of birds and the smells of spring filled the air. The two-mile trip would have been quite pleasant, if only her stomach wasn’t churning over nearly as madly as her mind.
The station was quiet and, looking at the clock over the entrance, she knew the ten past twelve had just been and gone. She had plenty of time to compose herself before Howard arrived and the truth of this thing between them could be established. But as she headed for the waiting room, she was shocked to see him sitting on a wooden bench, staring at the track. He jumped up immediately, hearing her footsteps, and looked at her with a mixture of wonder and delight.
‘My God. Is that really you? Or am I dreaming?’ He stepped towards her and she felt indescribably nervous. He was so much thinner than when she’d seen him back in 1916 and, like Clarence, he had an unhealthy pallor to his skin and a haunted look about his eyes.
They came to a halt a few paces apart.
‘I wasn’t expecting you yet,’ was all she could manage.
He shrugged. ‘I caught an earlier train. I wanted to get out of London. Too many military personnel buzzing about. The whole point of me being here is to leave that world behind for a while. Father said he’d pick me up in the old motor car and I was quite content waiting on the platform.’
‘They’ve sent me, I’m afraid. The motor is playing up.’
‘Infinitely preferable.’ His eyes darted about, unable to settle on one thing, least of all her face, and she sensed he was as nervous as she.
‘You’ll have to carry your bag, though. I came on foot.’
‘But the ground beneath my feet is dry. Besides, I much prefer a pleasant stroll through the lanes with you than listening to Father chunter on about the government and how he wishes he were young enough to fight.’
They exchanged a nervous smile and then set off together in the direction of Merriford Manor, walking barely two foot apart but not touching. Polite chatter ensued. How was Cook? Had Mother gone overboard with cake? Did Benji still hate school?
They’d just crossed the bridge by the ford and were in a quiet, tree-lined lane when he suddenly stopped.
‘Damn this,’ he said, throwing his kitbag to the ground and halting his steps. ‘Come here.’
As soon as she was close enough, he grabbed her shoulders and crushed her frame to his. For a second, she couldn’t breathe.
‘You’re all I’ve thought about in those moments when my mind had the space to do any rational thinking beyond keeping myself alive. And, after all those months, I started to doubt myself… Was I holding on to something that wasn’t real? But here you are and I’ve never felt more certain of anything.’ He cupped her chin with his hand and tilted her face to his. ‘I love you. I’ve always loved you.’
She couldn’t say it back, not because her feelings weren’t powerful, but because the words wouldn’t mean anything yet. What did she really know of romantic love? Looking at him in that moment, she certainly felt a dizzy, spinning something. But reading about it, daydreaming about it, wasn’t the same as experiencing it.
He leaned forward and rested his forehead on her own to the backdrop of a highly agitated blackbird above their heads, and she suspected they were close to the nest. But the squawks of the bird started to fade as everything around them ceased to exist. She felt an intense connection with the man before her, as though he was the only thing in the world at that moment, and sensed his need, as surely as if he shook her by the shoulders and pinned her to the nearest tree. And to her surprise, she felt that need too.
It was her clawing at his hair, pressing her body close to his, wanting to anchor every part of her to every part of him. She heard him groan as her breathing became fast and feverish, but didn’t stop to analyse what she was doing. Howard had now been a part of her life for six years and she knew him almost better than she knew anyone, save Benji and Cynthia. The clashes between them all this time had been masking the attraction. The lane was deserted but, in truth, neither of them would have cared should a whole regiment have marched by.
‘Not here.’ Just two words as he swept up the leather handles of his canvas bag with one hand and gripped one of hers with the other. He strode fifty yards to the edge of the trees and then took a path to their left, through a carpet of late bluebells, many past their best but beautiful nonetheless.
Olivia stumbled a couple of times, but his strong arm stopped her from falling as he marched forward with a grim determination. She knew what was happening – why he was leading her into the cover of tree canopies, and every part of her was willing it to be.
Finally, he threw his bag to the floor, slipped off his thick wool coat and spread it over a flat patch of ground. Out of the weak sunlight and in the gloom of the forest, she began to shiver.
‘You’re cold,’ he said, his brow concertinaed into a frown, as he embraced her once again and rubbed at her shoulders.
‘No, I’m nervous,’ she whispered into the thick cotton of his shirt, glad he couldn’t see her face.
He stopped rubbing and sighed. ‘This is madness. What the hell am I thinking? You’re so young, so innocent, so…’
He bent to retrieve his coat and she put out her hand to stop him, sliding her body under his and meeting his eye.
‘I said I was nervous, not unwilling.’ She tried to convey the sincerity of her words. ‘No one knows what is ahead, or when I’ll even see you again, and we must grab these precious moments. I want this too.’
Overriding his concern, he lowered her gently backwards and she wriggled her slim body to find a more comfortable space between the bumps of the woodland floor. They both knew time and the possible risk of discovery were against them, and this, along with the genuine feeling that her whole body might burst if this didn’t happen, made everything more electric.
A million frantic kisses and the hasty loosening of clothing before their eyes engaged and, for the surprisingly short duration of their fumbled and frantic coupling, their gaze remained entirely focused on each other. Just at the point when he started to shake, losing all focus, he pulled away from her and turned to his side, a small cry following his withdrawal, before he returned his attention to her.
‘I’m sorry. That was… over sooner than I expected. Did I hurt you?’ One hand came to rest on her cheek and he lay his exhausted body next to hers.
‘A bit, but it’s fine.’ And it really was. She wasn’t completely sure what had just happened. It was nothing like she’d imagined, not better or worse, just incredibly intense, but she knew one thing for certain now – she loved him.
‘Your parents will start to wonder where we are,’ she pointed out.
He glanced at the new wristwatch that his father had sent out in the Christmas parcel Olivia had helped his mother put together.
‘They aren’t expecting us yet. Can we enjoy the peace for a little while longer? Mother can be so overwhelming.’
‘Only because she misses you so desperately.’
She hitched herself up on her elbows and leaned over to kiss him, letting the rough hairs of his moustache graze across her lips, before reaching for a bluebell and threading the stem through his thick, auburn hair. He smiled at her action and then closed his eyes, not bothered by her frivolous attentions. He’d been exhausted before they’d lain together, but now he was truly spent. She continued to snap off flowers and weave them into a crown until he resembled a woodland sprite from her childhood picture books. Finally, she nestled back into his arm.
‘How does it feel to have claimed a virgin?’ she asked, a gentle smile playing across her lips. He was only a year older than her age-wise, but who knew how old in terms of experiences. Had she been a disappointment?
He turned to face her, his eyes twinkling as he raised both eyebrows. ‘I don’t know.’ He grinned. ‘You tell me.’
It took her a moment to realise what he was saying, but he merely shrugged. ‘I left these shores an innocent and never touched the Frenchwomen behind the lines. I understood the desperate men, seeking an hour of solace, a few minutes of human touch, but I have always saved myself for you – the strange girl who appeared in our lives and turned my world upside down.’ She was surprised and flattered all at once. ‘It’s I who should apologise, but we can learn together, can’t we? We have a lifetime to get it right.’ He paused, suddenly nervous and biting at his bottom lip. ‘You will marry me, won’t you?’
And that was his grand proposal – an anxious need to be reassured that what they had hastily and recklessly done together across a dying carpet of bluebells on the woodland floor that April afternoon, a halo of blue flowers woven through his hair, was as momentous to her as it was to him.
‘Surely,’ she said, the tip of her fingers tracing the deep furrows in his brow and a hint of mischief in her eyes, ‘my body has already given you my answer, Sprinkles.’