Chapter 13 Ormdale
Chapter thirteen
Ormdale
“They want me to watch over Una?“ was Pip’s incredulous response when his stepfather came in to the cottage and told him to pack up some things to take to the abbey for the night. Pip had been painting some paper dolls for his half sister while she napped. His mother sat knitting nearby.
“But there’s nothing wrong with her,” Pip protested. “The doctor himself said she’s perfectly recovered.”
“Whatever the state of her health,” Janushek said, “she was attacked in her own home by a stranger. It might have been—worse. Much worse.”
“Well, if you ask me,” grumbled Pip, “it was rather naive of her to go wandering the abbey at night alone like something out of Wilkie Collins if she was worried about burglary. That man was plainly bad news.”
Pip could tell he was coming off badly in this conversation, but if Una wasn’t his sister, what claim did she really have upon him? He’d be blasted if he’d go back to being an unpaid odd-jobs boy again, even for her. Janushek, of all people, with his talk of class warfare, should understand that!
“If he was plainly bad news, then why didn’t you sound the alarm?” asked Janushek. “You were the first to meet him. Why didn’t you impress us all with your foresight?”
Pip fell silent. He had suspected but had not admitted this failure to himself yet, and it hurt to have it pointed out. And he thought his stepfather was being unnecessarily dramatic.
“Well, sir,“ Pip said, “I suppose I owe them whatever they ask of me, since I’m nothing but a charity case.”
His mother’s knitting needles stopped moving and Janushek’s eye twitched. He didn’t like being called sir, and Pip knew it.
And Janushek knew that he knew it.
Pip’s mother laid down her knitting, her amber eyes kindling, and Pip instantly regretted that sir.
“Being mistreated doesn’t give you the right to turn around and mistreat others, lad,” she said. “If it did, there’d be no end. Think of it!”
Pip had hardly ever felt more betrayed. And he’d spoiled one of the paper dolls’ faces.
Janushek heaved a sigh. “So you don’t want to work at the kilns, Pip, and you don’t want to help at the abbey. What do you want—other than a lavish trip to Italy?”
Janushek had offered him a job at the limeworks where he was supervisor. It was no exaggeration to say that Pip loathed the idea—to him, it would be going backward in every way.
“I’ll go right away, then—Grandmam will give me something for my supper at the abbey, I suppose,” Pip said with as much dignity as he could gather, pushing way the paper and watercolours. “These are for Bella when she wakes up.”
As Pip lugged a bag with his overnight things up the long path to the abbey, he almost wept with frustration.
Why couldn’t his mother and stepfather understand that he—not Una—was the one suffering a great misfortune? A knock on the head would heal. But Pip’s misfortune was like that of Tantalus in the Underworld—to see and smell the good things in life, knowing they would remain forever out of his reach.
“Oh, Pip, thank goodness!” was Una’s greeting.
He found her in the sitting room, a lot of photographs spread out around her and supper grown cold on a tray at her elbow. Oolong was curled in her lap, Una’s shawl wrapped round him. His beady eyes appraised Pip, as if searching him for some hidden perfidy.
“I haven’t been able to stop thinking about our conversation,” she said.
His resentment towards her had been building the whole way, but this stopped it in its tracks.
“Really?” said Pip.
“I have a theory,” she said, her eyes very blue with excitement.
“Tell me,” he said, sitting beside her and ignoring Oolong.
“Your mother hasn’t—she hasn’t said anything more?” she asked.
He shook his head and grabbed the piece of porkpie for himself.
“Yes, do eat it, I’m not hungry,” Una said. “You see, I’ve been thinking. My father wasn’t—well, he wasn’t a kind man. But you weren’t sent to that children’s home in Skipton where foundlings go. There must have been a reason. Why did he let Lily raise you here?”
Pip stopped chewing.
“The only thing I can think of is this,” continued Una. “There was someone else living at Wormwood Abbey when you were born, someone else who might have—well, who would have been the right age.” Una’s cheeks were pink as she pulled out a tintype. “My brother.”
Pip remembered the stiff young man in the photograph.
Percy Worms had perished in the caves under the dale when Pip was ten.
Pip remembered the search party with their torches and ropes and grim faces.
He remembered the dismal funeral and the anxiety at the abbey when the new squire came from the south—a squire that knew nothing of the dale and its creatures and set everyone on edge.
And Pip had been there all along—the squire’s grandson, if he understood what Una was suggesting?
Pip began to run hungrily through all the small memories he had of Percy.
He’d cleaned his boots for him, he remembered that.
Had there ever been anything in his eyes, any special warmth or regard for the by-blow running errands about the abbey?
“He was only a year older than your mother,” Una said softly, “I—well, I’m frightfully sorry, Pip.”
Una’s apology startled Pip out of his gloomy reverie. He’d felt sullen enough towards her until a moment ago, but still, he didn’t see how any of this could be her fault. “What for?”
“It just seems—unfair,” she said, biting her lip.
“There’s always been so much talk of how unfair it is that the estate couldn’t be left to us girls.
But you were here all along, too. It’s not your fault my brother didn’t have the backbone to marry your mother.
If he had everything would have been different. ”
There was a pause, in which Pip felt ill at the contrast between what his life could have been and what it was.
“It seems just as unfair to me that—well, that you couldn’t inherit either,“ she finished.
Una put her hand over his very gently.
“Yes,” he said, despite the lump in his throat. “It does.”
They looked at the photograph together in silence.
“Do you think—do I look like him?” he asked shakily at last.
“Perhaps. The hair is similar. And Lily is so fair, so you must have got it from your father.” Una paused. “Don’t you think you ought to tell your mother that we guessed it?”
Pip felt a flair of panic.
“I suppose it would be very painful to bring up,” she said sympathetically, “but it might relieve her mind.”
Pip was surprised by the notion that there might be something to resolve on his mother’s part, and he let it slide away quickly. His mother was happy. Anyone could see that. It was Pip that still suffered from the consequences of other people’s actions.
“Can I keep it?” Pip asked, holding up the tintype.
“Of course!” Una looked at him, an uncertain smile wavering on her lips. “Have you thought what it means? If we’re right about this?”
Pip blinked.
“It means I’m your aunt,” said Una.
She looked very grave, as if she took her new avuncular responsibilities terribly seriously.
Una really is rather a dear, Pip thought to himself. Perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad staying at the abbey with her. At least his stepfather would have less opportunities to press him to take a job at the limeworks.
“Oh, I almost forgot!” Pip said, patting his pockets. “Oolong dropped this on my foot last night.” He produced a small key. Oolong raised his head for an instant. It seemed to tire him, for he dropped it again at once.
“Oh,” Una breathed. “Thank heavens. I thought that man had taken it.” She stroked Oolong admiringly. “Oh, you clever, clever dragon!”
Pip felt a little jealous. “Well, you needn’t worry about that anymore. I’ve come to stay here at the abbey for a few nights—just until you feel more secure.”
“Oh!” Una exclaimed in delight. “How sweet of you to think of it!”
Pip’s cheeks went hot.
“Will you—will you do something else for me, Pip?” Una asked. “Will you just go and see the relic if still there in the box? I don’t think I can face the muniments room for a few days.”
Pip nodded eagerly. “Of course!”
“You are the veriest dear, Pip,” Una said gratefully. “Here’s the key to the door; you’ll need it as well as the lockbox key.” She fondled the dragon’s ears thoughtfully. “I thought Oolong was trying to fetch Janushek to help me last night—but perhaps it was you.”
“Perhaps it was,” he said, ignoring Oolong’s expression.