Stranger at the Manor by Mary Kingswood

15: The Smithy

The journey to Jedburgh was as strange a one as any Peter had undertaken, yet all the more pleasurable for that. There was so little purpose to it, for they went there only to turn round and return again, and yet somehow that relieved them of all worries. There was no question of being early or late, of arriving anywhere or being expected, so they simply travelled, eating when they were hungry and stopping when they were tired. It was a holiday from all the usual cares of the road.

The company was agreeable, too. Christian Barnaby was a pleasant young man, not well educated but sensible and practical. His manners were occasionally rough, which was only to be expected, but he quickly learnt to adapt better ones and fitted in very well with their little party. On the first night, the inn they chose was small and unpretentious with no private parlour, so they ate in the common room and somehow it seemed perfectly natural. Taylor made friends with the local working men clustered around the serving counter, but Peter, Phyllida, Charu and Christian sat in a secluded corner with jugs of foamy ale for hours, talking like old friends.

One subject interested Peter particularly, and he questioned Christian closely on the matter of coach building.

“You have some plan in mind, Mr Winslade, I can tell,” Phyllida said. “I never knew you take such an interest in the making of carriages before.”

“I do have a plan in mind, yes. Barnaby has given me an idea. Now that I no longer have a bank to run, I shall need to start up a new business to keep me occupied. I had thought to go back to furniture, but coaches… that has possibilities. And I should need an expert coach builder.”

Christian set down his tankard and gazed at him, a slow smile spreading across his face. “Me?”

“Why not? The scheme is so well suited to us both — I have the business experience, and you have the practical knowledge and the skill of your hands.”

With a chuckle, Christian said, “So you’d just run the business and I’d make the carriages?”

“More or less, yes. I can help out with the making, but I am no craftsman, just an enthusiastic amateur.”

“But you wouldn’t want to settle in Harrogate, would you?” 

“Would you mind settling somewhere else?”

“Course not! I can live and work anywhere, and I wouldn’t be treading on Mr Beckford’s turf. Where did you have in mind? Leeds? That was your old haunt, wasn’t it?”

Phyllida gasped. “Leeds? You will not go back to Leeds… will you?” Her expression was so shocked that Peter’s heart twisted in anguish, but there was a spark of hope, too. She wanted him to stay!

“No, no! Not Leeds,” he said quickly. “I thought… Shropshire. Great Maeswood, perhaps. After all, there is a smith there for the metal parts, and Preece’s son is a noted woodworker. I had a very pleasant conversation with him after church once.”

He watched her face carefully, as the alarm drained away. “You would start your business in Great Maeswood?”

“Perhaps,” he said carefully. “It would be ideal, but it all depends.”

“On what does it depend?” she said, puzzled, and perhaps a little hurt. That was interesting.

“On you, principally.”

Now she was even more puzzled. “On me? But why?”

He took a deep breath. This was the moment where it might all fall apart, but he had to try it. He could not give up hope, he would never give up hope, but the plan was risky.

“May I speak freely?”

Charu jumped to her feet. “I shall just go and—”

“No, stay,” Peter said. “You have already surmised a great deal, I suspect. Miss Beasley, may I suggest that we include Charu in our confidences? Let us have no secrets between us.” Phyllida gave a quick nod, so he plunged on. “Taylor has already got the idea in his head that Christian is your son, and will likely spread that rumour everywhere in Shropshire. Better by far to give the gossips another story to replace it, would you not agree? If Christian appears in Great Maeswood as my partner in a coach building business, people will see him that way and not think anything of Taylor’s story. We can set it down as a misunderstanding by the orphanage. After all, you never went inside, did you? I was the one who went there, not you. And… and Christian will be in Great Maeswood, and you will be able to see him.”

And I will be able to see you.

It was the flimsiest of excuses, and the most selfish of motives. The fear of losing her precious company had come to haunt him. The dread that she would marry Lord Silberry had receded somewhat, but he was no nearer achieving his own heart’s desire. Yet he could not conceive of surrendering his hopes. All he asked in life was to be able to see Phyllida from time to time, but he would not be able to trespass on his cousin’s kindness for much longer. He had to settle somewhere, and the business with Christian would give him the perfect reason to be in Great Maeswood itself, where he might at any moment encounter Phyllida on the street, in a shop, while visiting. He would still have some very small part in her life. Perhaps one day he would be able to persuade her to marry him, or if he were never to have that joy, he needed to be near her. He could not bear the prospect of never seeing her again, and Christian was his opening into her life.

But would she accept it? He held his breath.

She smiled. “That would be lovely.”

He exhaled slowly. The rest of the evening passed in planning for the new business, and Peter went to his lumpy, not too clean bed exhilarated with the success of his scheme.

~~~~~

Each day their little train of carriages crept further north. Ripon, Northallerton, Darlington and Durham in turn rose up ahead, were passed through and then fell behind them, and with every mile the landscape became wilder, less populous, more forbidding. It was fortunate that the weather held mild and dry, so that the roads were as good as they ever were and progress was steady.

From Newcastle, they turned off the Great North Road and immediately found themselves crossing rocky, windswept moorland. Peter was rather pleased that his masquerade as a footman allowed him to sit beside Christian on the box of the new carriage enjoying the finest views imaginable, and neither the wind nor the rigours of long hours on the road dented his pleasure. He would have greatly preferred to ride inside with Phyllida, but the presence of the chattering Charu was an even greater deterrent. To sit opposite Phyllida and yet be afforded no possibility of conversation with her was a torment not to be borne.

Inns were few and far between, their facilities basic, but the owner of the new carriage had given Christian a list of the best inns to change horses or stop overnight, so they suffered no hitch in their advance. Twice Peter had been obliged to sleep in the straw above the stables, for the sole bedroom available had gone to the ladies, but he found the location not uncomfortable, apart from the inconvenience of pieces of straw lodging in his clothing and itching abominably.

Early on the fourth day of their travel, the road crawled up a particularly steep incline to pass through a line of hills. At the turnpike at the top, they were informed that they were now in Scotland, and only eleven miles from Jedburgh.

“Almost there,” Peter said cheerfully, shading his eyes with his hand as if he could detect the chimneys of Jedburgh from so far away.

“Aye, if the horses can make it,” Taylor said darkly. “Come and look at this shoe, Barnaby. I’m a bit worried about it.”

Christian agreed. “Several nails gone, and another loose. We’ll need to find a smithy.”

“Ye’ll find a smith down yonder,” the toll-gate keeper told them, pointing down the Jedburgh road. “Tis on yer way.”

Beyond the pass, the road wound back and forth to descend. Phyllida and Charu alighted from the Winslade carriage to relieve the horses.

“What desolate country,” Phyllida said, gazing at the bleakness of the hills all around them.

“And not a house to be seen in any direction, except the toll house,” Charu said, trying in vain to pull her cloak about her against the insistence of the mischievous wind.

“I see smoke in the distance,” Phyllida said. “Down at the bottom of the hill, do you see? That will be the smithy. Only a mile or two to walk.”

“You’d better ride with me,” Christian said cheerfully, holding the door of the new carriage open for them. “No need to walk.”

“Are you sure the new owner will not mind?” Phyllida peered inside. “Well, how luxurious. We shall be very grand indeed. Whose are the arms on the door?”

“Lord Alsbury. He’s a viscount, so you can be a viscountess for ten minutes,” he said, chuckling as she stepped inside.

“Lovely!” Charu said, climbing aboard and sitting down on the rear-facing seat. “Goodness me, how plush these squabs are. So very comfortable, and everything in the finest velvet. Well, I must just remove my gloves to feel it. So soft! Everything so charmingly appointed that I—”

Christian shut the door and Charu’s voice was reduced to a low murmur. Peter climbed up onto the box beside Christian and they moved off slowly down the hill.

“We are not too heavy for the steepness of the road?” Peter asked, suddenly nervous as he surveyed the bends ahead.

Christian laughed. “Not if the horses know their business, and these seem to. We take it slowly, that’s all, and this is a light carriage with no great weight to carry. If the mail coaches can use this road, we have nothing to fear.”

It appeared he was right, for they reached the bottom of the hill in perfect safety. Not a mile further on was a small community of stone-built cottages, built low to the ground as if huddled against the wind. From the largest building came the welcome flickering flames of a smithy fire, and the clang of metal on metal. Here they stopped and descended.

The smith and his bellows boy came out to greet them.

“G’day to ye,” the smith boomed. His eyes ranged over the carriage, then the passengers, finally settling on Charu. Slowly he smiled. “Ah! Ye’ll be wantin’ to be wed, then. I can do that for ye.”

For an instant, Peter was flummoxed, until he remembered — they were in Scotland! It was not the famous Gretna smith, but presumably every smith near the border was accustomed to performing instant weddings over the anvil, for those too young to marry in England without a parent’s permission. He must think Charu had run away to marry — him?

He laughed. “No, no, no! We are not wanting a wedding.”

Charu laughed too. “Goodness me, no! No wedding, not today. We only want your services as—”

“Yes.”

Phyllida’s voice was loud enough to reduce them all to silence.

“Yes,” she said more quietly. “I should like to get married.” She gazed steadily at Peter.

Everything inside him melted into a roiling mass of hope and terror and bewilderment… but mostly joy. She wanted him! He had no idea why, or what had changed her mind, but… oh, thank God, all his never-dared-to-be-formulated dreams were coming true. Could it be possible? How? Why?

“Peter?” she said, her head tipped to one side.

He was vaguely aware of Charu clapping her hands excitedly, of Christian smiling, of Taylor rumbling up with the other carriage, of the smith sending the boy off to fetch someone. Witnesses, he said. There had to be witnesses. But Peter could only stare in bemusement at Phyllida’s lovely face, a wry smile on her lips.

He cleared his throat. “We… we should talk about this,” he croaked. “In private.”

“If we step a little way down the road, we shall not be overheard,” she said composedly. She was so calm! In the middle of an impulsive proposal, of upending her life utterly, she could still think rationally. And that brought him back to his senses a little. She could not be so calm if she were in love with him, so there was something else driving this abrupt change of heart.

He walked beside her until they had put a little distance between them and the smithy, and a stunted gorse bush shielded them from view.

“You seem reluctant, Peter,” she said softly. “I thought you wanted this.”

“I do. God knows I do! You cannot imagine how much I want it, but… I believed you did not want to marry.”

“So I felt, certainly, but the unexpected effect of spending long hours in a carriage with nothing much to do is that one has unlimited time to think. I have been doing a prodigious amount of thinking these last few days. Lord Silberry started me pondering the merits of marriage. Not that I was ever tempted by him, particularly, but I have thought a great deal of his loneliness. He has friends, and he has family too, but no one who shares every part of his life — a companion of the heart, if you will. That is very much my own case, too. A brother is not at all the same. And his lordship talked too of the difficulty of finding a likely marriage partner and how one knows if a person will be compatible. He said it is a leap in the dark, and he is right, I think. When I found Christian, I thought perhaps he would fill that void in my life, but of course that cannot be. He will marry one day and have a person who is the companion of his heart, and will leave his mother behind. Even if I had raised him, he would leave me behind, and that is as it should be. And then I thought of you and your spirit of adventure. You have pushed me into my own adventures and I have enjoyed them. Perhaps it is time for an even greater adventure. And Peter…” A quick smile. “You told me that a man who cared for me would not be deterred by my history, and I can see that is true. If you are prepared to overlook my lack of virtue, then I cannot use it as an excuse.”

“But this is so sudden. Had you planned this? Scotland and a quick marriage without the bother of banns and so on?”

“Oh no. I was just beginning to wonder what it might be like… whether I should consider it, and there was the smith all ready to perform the ceremony so I thought… why not?”

“It is so unlike you to be impulsive, Phyllida.”

“No, actually I believe that impulsiveness is in my character, and I have been ruthlessly suppressing it for years. It led me astray once, but I feel sure that it can also lead to better outcomes, like this journey, which is enormously enjoyable to a spinster who has lived retired for too many years. That was an impulse I have not regretted. If I were truly not impulsive, I should still be at home, knitting socks.”

“Do you not want to go home first, have the banns called, have your friends about you and your brother to give you away?”

“No! Oh, no, no, no! If I go home, then Roland will look at me anxiously and wonder why on earth I want to change things when we were going on so comfortably, and Viola will tell me I am a silly girl who should know better at my age, and my courage will fail me. I shall curl up into a ball and become mousy Miss Beasley again and that will be the end of it. No, it must be here and now. Oh Peter, do you not understand what you have done? You have set me free, my dear friend. I feel as if I were one of those great balloons that intrepid aeronauts fill with heated air to rise up into the sky. At Great Maeswood I was tethered to the ground, held fast, but with every stage of our journey north, the tethers have been loosening. I can fly, Peter! Perhaps I will crash to the ground later, but for now I want to fly, to be free. I cannot do that alone, but with you… I can do anything. Set me free. Please.”

His heart was so full he could barely speak, but there was one remaining obstacle and it was insuperable. “I cannot afford it,” he whispered. “One day, perhaps, but at this moment I cannot keep a wife. I have no money, Phyllida.”

“But I have,” she said simply. “Aunt Margery left me an inheritance worth four hundred pounds a year, with no conditions. Most of it has been going to the orphanage, but that is no longer necessary. We can live on four hundred a year, just until you get back on your feet again. Or for ever, if need be. What do you say?”

Wordlessly he nodded and they turned to walk back to the smithy to be married. Joy exploded inside him like a firework, setting him afire with hope for the future. She would be his own dear companion of the heart, and walk through life beside him. This was actually going to happen. He could scarcely believe it. She had said nothing of love, and perhaps she would never love him, not as he loved her, but she would be his, she would be his wife and it was enough. It was more than enough.

The next hour was the strangest of Peter’s life. The ceremony was short, the words unfamiliar. The entire community, some twenty souls, came to watch, and toast their health in some foul brew of their own concoction. There was a register to sign, surprisingly, and the smith gave them a copy of the entry to prove the marriage had taken place. Phyllida provided her own ring, the one she had worn long ago in her pretence as Mrs Barnaby.

And then the smith shod their horse, they resumed their journey and drove on to Jedburgh. In honour of the occasion, Charu rode on the box with Christian, while the newlyweds sat in the splendour of Lord Alsbury’s new carriage. After the whirl of the marriage, now they were silent. Peter was too dazed to speak, but whenever he dared to look at Phyllida, she had a little smile curving up her mouth. He took it as a good sign.

They took rooms at the Black Bull in Jedburgh, which mercifully had a parlour they could use, and Christian delivered the carriage to the viscount, returning within the hour. Whatever fog of silence enfolded the newly married couple, Charu was unaffected, and her voice filled the oddly nervous atmosphere.

There was no wedding breakfast and the dinner was indifferent, but nobody much cared. Taylor grinned inanely the whole time, and even lurked for the entire meal, watching them intently, as if waiting for them to break into lover-like poetic ramblings, or fall into each other’s arms. Eventually, the endless evening was over, and they could retreat upstairs.

“You will not need me to undress you tonight,” Charu said to Phyllida, covering her giggles with one hand before she disappeared into her own room further down the corridor.

Silently, Peter held the door open for Phyllida to enter their room. It was not very prepossessing. Being on the upper floor, it was under the slope of the roof, so he could only stand upright in the middle of the room. The bed looked none too clean, although they had their own linen, at least. A cracked ewer and basin stood on a badly stained washstand. On one wall was a sampler, grimy with age, which read, ‘Bless this house.’

“This is not quite what I would wish for your wedding night,” he said, gazing around in distaste.

“It hardly matters,” she said, turning round to face him.

She was still calm, and her gentle smile warmed his heart. He took a step towards her, then stopped hesitantly.

“May I kiss you?”

The sudden dismay on her face shook him. Was he not even to have that comfort?

“You said once that you wished you could kiss me and see where that led,” she said quietly. “But I already know where it leads… or where it led me, in any event.”

“Is it not different now? Now that we are married?”

“Perhaps. I cannot tell. I only know that I am afraid… of becoming that wicked person again. Even thinking about it brings back all the memories.”

Ah, was that it? But that was a problem he could address. “You must not fear your own feelings, Phyllida. Wherever our kisses lead us, you are quite safe now… you are safe with me. We will make new memories together, and they will be happier ones, I promise you.”

She smiled then, and sighed. “You are a good man, Peter Winslade, and I trust you. Kiss me now.”

He took the final step that brought them together, and carefully took her in his arms. They were almost the same height, so he had no need to bend to touch his lips to hers. A shudder ran through him — she was his! The sweet warmth of that first delicate coming together was almost more than he could bear. But he held himself in check. On no account must he alarm her. At first she responded with a gentle softness, tentative, nervous, but gradually it turned into something more. Not passionate, exactly, but willing. Her arms crept around him, and dear God, she was so lovely and warm and yielding and utterly entrancing. When eventually he lifted his lips from hers, she still had her eyes closed.

“Turn around,” he whispered.

“Why?”

“So that I can unfasten your gown, since Charu has abandoned you. Unless you wish to go to bed fully clothed, of course.”

Obediently, and without the least hesitation, she spun out of his arms, and with trembling fingers he began to work on the buttons on the back of her gown.