5 A Place To Sleep
Cal was not sure whether to be pleased or not at the summary dismissal of the Garths.
On the one hand, it was a compliment that the duke preferred Cal’s thoughts to Garth’s, but on the other, it did nothing to reduce the animosity Garth felt towards him.
And since the duke had made it clear that it was only his thoughts that were wanted, and not Cal himself, he would in due course have to return to Lampton Priory and face whatever retribution Garth dreamt up for him.
The atmosphere at dinner that evening was frosty in the extreme.
The Garths were too offended to be civil, but nor did they have the courage to be rude to the duke’s face.
Instead they sat in smouldering silence, responding only if forced to it.
Even Violetta, normally at ease in any company, was subdued.
Cal sat where he was directed by the duchess, which was too far away from Cora for any chance of conversation, but from time to time she glanced his way and smiled at him.
She looked different tonight, but he couldn’t put his finger on what the change was.
Her hair, perhaps, was a little more simply styled and she looked more elegant.
Not that she had been inelegant before, but he had thought her matronly.
Now… he was not sure how he would describe her.
Enticing… alluring… desirable… the words rose unbidden in his mind.
He tamped them down firmly. Such nonsense, at his age, to be thinking of a woman in those terms!
She was a respectable widow, the mother of a future duke, a woman who would not dare to cross the stepping stones because she had been told not to.
Was there any way such a timid soul would ever do anything so outrageous as to look at an under-gardener?
Yet she did look at him, in the way that a woman looks at a man she’s attracted to, which was unnerving.
As soon as the gentlemen started moving away from the table after the port, Cal escaped to the hall. Finding Froggett loitering watchfully, he said, “If I’m missed, tell them I’ve gone outside for a breath of air.”
“Very good, sir,” the butler said, bowing respectfully.
“You needn’t call me sir,” Cal said, amused. “I’m several rungs lower on the social ladder than you are.”
“You are his grace’s guest, sir,” Froggett said implacably. “I trust his grace’s judgement implicitly.”
There was no arguing with a duke, or with his butler, for that matter, so Cal sensibly didn’t attempt it.
He changed into his everyday clothes and left the house through the front door.
From there, strategically placed lamps lit his way to the stables, and then on into the darkness on the track to the village.
It was a good path and the gibbous moon was sufficient to light his way, even without a lantern.
It was a little above a mile, he estimated, to the road that ran along the River Brin, and the Dog and Duck was almost the first building he encountered as he entered the village.
The street door opened into a square lobby with several doors off it, but the cheerful noise of men relaxing over their beer led him to the tap room.
The air was filled with smoke, both from the fire and from the clay pipes several of the men sported.
Groups of men huddled over cribbage boards or table skittles, or sat in cheerful clusters.
At his entry, thirty or more faces turned towards him, and the noise level dropped as the drinkers assessed the newcomer.
“Evening,” Cal said to the room at large, and several of the patrons responded in like manner or nodded to him.
“Bill!” someone yelled out. “Thirsty man arrived.”
“Aye, that’s me,” Cal said, raising a ripple of laughter.
Behind the counter, the innkeeper entered in a rush, looking rather flustered.
“Stranger needs a drink, Bill,” someone said.
Before Cal could make his way to the counter, the face of Ben Lovell, the gamekeeper, loomed out of the smoky atmosphere. “Garford, you made it. Welcome. Everyone, this is Cal Garford, gardener and guest of his grace.”
There was a general chorus of greetings, to which Cal responded with a wave. The innkeeper pushed a pot of beer into his hand, but when he reached for his purse, the man said, “This one’s on the ’ouse. Any friend o’ Ben’s is a friend to all of us.”
“Come and sit with us,” the gamekeeper said.
In the corner, sitting around an abandoned game of cards, were three men, introduced as Staineybank’s head groom, the bailiff and the village smith, all men of about Cal’s age.
Another stool was fetched, the cards were gathered up and the four settled down to interrogate Cal.
It was not often that someone of their own social rank also dined with the duke, and, although they were subtle in their questioning, they were keen to hear all he was willing to tell.
Cal told them a little harmless news of the duke’s family, and, rather cautiously, something of the Garths.
He could not avoid the fact that they were to leave the next morning, but he said nothing of the reason for it.
As it happened, there was no need to, for the footmen had been in the drawing room hearing every word, which had been conveyed to the Dog and Duck by Jack Burnham, the head groom, before Cal had even left Staineybank.
They all knew, too, that there was animosity between Cal and the Garths, and he was pressed to explain it.
“I can’t rightly tell you why,” he said, with a shrug. “I’ve never done anything to Mr Garth or any of the family to give them cause to take me in dislike.”
“Why don’t ’e turn you off if he dislikes you so much?” Burnham said. “You’re just a servant like any other. ’E can do as ’e pleases, can’t ’e?”
Cal shrugged. “You’d need to ask him that. I’ve no answer to give you.”
The four men persevered for a while, but when they saw that Cal was not going to answer their questions they gave it up. He bought the next round of beer, and felt entitled to turn the conversation towards his own interests.
After paying suitable tribute to the magnificence of the duke’s woodlands, he said, “I found a small hut in the woods, just above the stepping stones. Old charcoal burner’s place, looks like. Anyone use it now?”
“No one lives there,” the bailiff answered. “Ben, you’re about the woods more than I am. You ever see anyone there?”
Ben Lovell shook his head. “No one regular. Folk may shelter from the rain sometimes, who knows?”
Cal said carefully, “Someone’s been there lately. The brambles have been cut back outside one of the windows, and the table looks clean. Fine view from there.”
“That was me,” Lovell said. “I go there sometimes to have my piece.”
“Piece?” Cal said.
“Piece of bread… meat, cheese, whatever I have. Middle of the day, a rest and a bite to eat. Might as well keep the window clear of growth, enjoy the view.”
Cal remembered the lack of crumbs, but chose not to pursue that point. “Those stepping stones — I hear no one’s supposed to use them. What’s the reason for that?”
It was the bailiff who answered. “That were the duchess’s doing after the boy died. He was drownded in the lake, and she thought it must’ve been because he fell on the stepping stones and cracked his head open, poor little feller. Ben here found the poor mite, an’ fished him out.”
“Wished I’d seen him sooner,” the gamekeeper said, shaking his head sorrowfully.
“I used to see him playing sometimes. From the hut, you can see the whole of the front lawns down to the lake, and he’d run about, his nurse chasing after him.
Or the duchess — she was with him a lot of the time, but that day, she wasn’t there, it was just the nurse.
I was eating my piece at the hut, and he was down on the lawns playing on a swing the duke’d put up for him.
Then… he just disappeared, and I never noticed.
First thing I saw was the poor lad floating in the water.
I ran down as fast as I could and pulled him out but it was too late.
He was gone. Nothing anyone could do. Dreadful day, that was. Terrible day.”
“You did what you could, Ben,” the bailiff said. “Wasn’t your fault. Wasn’t anyone’s fault. Children are curious, that’s all. Get into places they shouldn’t.”
“Aye, and water’s fascinating to a little’un,” Burnham said.
“If only I’d seen him sooner,” Ben said sadly.
“Two minutes would’ve made all the difference.
If only I’d been watching… paid more attention.
That’s why I watch the family so much now…
make sure nothing terrible happens to any of them ever again, and now there’s more babes to worry about.
Don’t ever want to go through another day like that, not ever. ”
The general noise in the room had lowered as soon as Cal sat down, as everyone strained to hear what was said, but now there was a murmur from the listeners.
“The poor duchess!… Heard her screams all the way to the stables…. Never forget his grace’s face at the funeral… Fourth time, but it never gets easier… Never been the same since, poor man… and now the new heir’s got hisself two girls… must be the unluckiest duke in the Kingdom, God bless ’im.”
“Aye, God bless ’em all,” was repeated around the room, and after that very little was spoken of but the duke, and of his four sons and three daughters, all dead and buried now, and the superstitious country belief that he would never have an heir to continue the line.
Cal sat through another round of drinks, saying very little, and then set off back to Staineybank, accompanied by the bailiff and gamekeeper as far as the edge of the village, and by the head groom all the way back to the stables.
Happily for his peace of mind, Burnham was a taciturn man and said very little.