Constance sat facing Nathan over the breakfast table at Fenay Hall, her expression a mixture of disgust and dismay. It was a week or so after the fight at the Mill, Jonas was still in bed and Felicity was in London for a few days.
‘Is it true you have resumed your relationship with that mill girl?’
Nathan’s spirits drooped. As he lifted the cover on a serving dish containing rashers of grilled bacon, he wondered who his mother’s informants were. Although she would deny it, Constance was always conversant with village gossip.
‘It will ruin your reputation. We’ll be the talk of the valley,’ she persisted. She would have said more had Nathan not slammed down the cover with a resounding clash. Constance’s cutlery clattered on her plate, her shocked expression egging Nathan on.
‘Yes, I have, and furthermore I intend to marry her. I don’t care a jot for what you and your high minded friends in the valley think.’
Constance blinked fat tears down her cheeks and clutched at her chest. ‘See what this is doing to me, Nathan, and to you,’ she sobbed, ‘you never used to take that tone with me.’
Nathan stood, determination making him appear taller and stronger. ‘I do so because you have no regard for my feelings, Mother. I love Lacey Barraclough regardless of her status in society and you had best get used to the idea.’ He made to walk away, saying, ‘I’ll bring her to meet you again. You will, I hope, make her welcome and treat her with respect.’
Constance pushed back her chair, tears forgotten. ‘Indeed I will not. I forbid you to marry that trollop. Do you hear me, Nathan?’
‘Yes, Mother, I hear you; I’ll invite her to call on you on Saturday afternoon, and if you have any love for me at all you will welcome her with the respect she deserves.’ And with that he stalked out of the room.
*
For the third time Lacey sat in the opulent drawing room at Fenay Hall, this time with only Constance for company. Before leaving her there, Nathan told Lacey that Constance had met his announcement that he intended to marry her with reservations and that it was now up to Lacey to persuade her to give them her approval. Speak with Mother, woman to woman, he had said, so with these words in mind, Lacey now faced Constance with outward calm and inner foreboding.
Constance sat ramrod straight, her mouth a grim line of dissatisfaction, her statuesque bulk filling the leather armchair directly opposite the one in which Lacey sat. For several minutes she didn’t speak, her eyes flicking from Lacey’s face to her shoes and back again as though she was measuring her for the oven. Lacey didn’t flinch.
Constance broke the silence, her tone harshly imperious. ‘It appears Nathan has some foolish notion regarding you. He says he intends to marry you.’
‘That’s correct, Mrs Brearley. Nathan and I have been friends for more than a year. We enjoyed one another’s company from the start, and now we’ve fallen in love. It’s only natural we should want to marry. I think we’re well matched; we have a lot in common.’
Constance glowered. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. The only thing common is you, girl: a common mill hand. What on earth can you offer Nathan, a boy privately educated; the son of an esteemed factory owner?’
Lacey ignored the insult. ‘I would love and respect him, share his interests and make him happy,’ she said firmly. ‘He loves me, Mrs Brearley.’
‘Pshaw! Nathan has no experience of love. He’s simply bewitched by a pretty face and the pleasure he takes in raising you above your station. Poor Nathan is given to flights of fancy. He has a romantic view of the world.’ Constance gave Lacey a withering glare. ‘You can’t expect him to present you to our circle of acquaintances. He’d be a laughing stock, the heir to a mill married to a weaver.’
Determined not to be drawn into an inflammatory exchange no matter how rude Constance was, Lacey suppressed an angry retort and said, ‘Weaving’s a worthwhile and necessary occupation, Mrs Brearley. I might not have had the benefit of a private education but I’m as well read and equally as intelligent as many another young woman of your acquaintance.’
Constance sneered. ‘Those women you refer to are ladies, something you will never be, regardless of your reading.’ She waved her hand dismissively and then sighed heavily. ‘If you’re as intelligent as you would have me believe, you’ll appreciate how preposterous his suggestion of marriage is. You no doubt impress him with your hoity-toity, outspoken manner, but he’s simply playing with you, the foolish boy.’
Lacey’s eyes blazed. ‘He’s not a boy; he’s a man. A man who knows what he wants from life. Your opinion of him is demeaning, to say the least.’ She leaned forward and looked directly at Constance, her tone softer but no less intense. ‘I might not be the right class of girl in your opinion, but I’m as well reared as anybody. My father’s a respected farmer and yes, he isn’t prosperous, but he earns his living honestly.’
Constance’s eyes glittered. ‘Talking of honesty, wasn’t your brother involved in the robbery at the Mill.’
Lacey’s heart plummeted and some of the fire went out of her. ‘He was, but only out of loyalty to me. He’s not a bad person.’
‘Bad enough to associate with criminals.’ Constance smirked. ‘Now, if you take my advice you’ll stop playing on Nathan’s sensitivities and allow this stupid romance to fizzle out, as I’m sure it will if you would desist from pestering him.’
Her patience tried too far, Lacey readily abandoned her resolution to stay calm at all costs. ‘Mrs Brearley, just because you’re the daughter of a mine owner and wife of a mill owner doesn’t give you the right to dictate what I do. I’m a woman with a mind of her own. I won’t always be in servitude to you and your kind.’
‘And you think to better yourself by inveigling my son into marrying you,’ Constance spat back, ‘is that your plan?’
Lacey jumped up, standing tall and proud. ‘Nothing could be further from my mind,’ she said vehemently, ‘I’m not marrying Nathan to climb the social ladder; I’d marry him even if he were a pauper. As for bettering myself, I can do that without him. It might surprise you to know that women can improve their standing in society without doing it on the coat tails of a man.’
Constance opened her mouth to intervene but Lacey, now in full flow was determined to have her say.
‘Just because you come from a privileged background and made a fortuitous marriage shouldn’t blind you to the fact that there are many different ways in which a woman can prove her worth – even though some choose to live in the shadow of their husbands.’
Constance had the grace to look abashed, but Lacey wasn’t finished.
‘Look around you, Mrs Brearley. It’s women who’ll make the world a better place once we cast aside our subservience to men. I consider myself equal to your son in every way.’
Constance’s lip curled. ‘I might have known it. I suppose you are one of those tiresome women involved in suffrage and the right to vote. How unladylike.’
Lacey chuckled. ‘Yes, I am, and it’s not unladylike. It’s our right to be recognised as worthy contributors to society. It’s wrong for men to treat us as second-class citizens.’ She paused for breath, an impish smile curving her lips. ‘Have you seen the state of the one lavatory a hundred and more women have to use at Brearley’s Mill?’
Constance’s eyes popped, a look of utter confusion on her face.
‘No, I thought not,’ Lacey continued, ‘because if you had you’d understand why I’m going to join the Trade Union. I’ll fight for better conditions for working women like me and at the same time, if Nathan wants to marry me, I’ll do that as well.’
‘Lavatories! Trade Unions! I’ve heard enough of your nonsense.’ Constance’s cheeks flaming and her breathing uneven, she charged to the door and flung it wide open.
‘I bid you good-day,’ she shrieked.
Lacey strode towards the door and then paused. ‘Thank you for giving me your time, Mrs Brearley,’ she said courteously, the hand she proffered left unshaken.
‘I don’t ever want to see you again,’ Constance hissed, as Lacey stepped into the hallway. ‘And should Nathan persist in this foolishness, I will do all in my power to put a stop to it.’
Lacey turned. ‘Do as you please, Mrs Brearley, for I certainly will.’ Without waiting for Nathan to appear she marched out of Fenay Hall for what she was sure would be the last time.
*
Later that afternoon, Lacey walked up Cuckoo Hill to the cairn, sure of finding Nathan there. It was a warm, balmy evening, the last rays of sun turning the heather to deepest purple and the dips and folds in the valley to gold: pauper’s gold her Dad called it, theirs for free to alleviate the misery of reality.
Nathan leaned dejectedly against the cairn, his hands stuffed deep in his trouser pockets. She could tell he was out of sorts – but then so was she. There were no welcoming smiles or kisses, both of them barely able to conceal their frustration. She waited for him to speak.
‘You certainly infuriated Mother this afternoon. What on earth did you say to her?’ He sounded like a pompous schoolmaster rebuking a naughty pupil.
‘I told her a few home truths,’ Lacey said jauntily, an unpleasant edge to her voice. ‘She didn’t want to hear them. She thinks I’m a low-class girl using you to climb the social ladder, and that once I stop pestering you, you’ll soon forget me.’
She paused, judging Nathan’s reaction, not liking what she saw. His expression conveyed neither sympathy nor outrage on Lacey’s behalf, nor did he make the quick rebuttal she had been expecting about him soon forgetting her. Shrugging off his silence, Lacey continued. ‘She thinks you only imagine you’re in love with me.’
Nathan emitted a deep sigh. ‘What exactly were the home truths, as you call them?’ He sounded wary, as though he dreaded hearing them, and paled as Lacey bluntly related the facts. She watched his frown deepen and his grey-blue eyes darken.
Nathan drew breath, sharply. ‘You were meant to endear yourself to her, not insult her. No wonder she dismissed you.’
Lacey’s shoulders slumped. It was useless to argue that it was she who had been insulted. She gave him a pitying look and shrugged her resignation. ‘There you go again, Nathan. Twisting the facts in favour of the upper class. The day you truly believe in equality is the day I’ll want you. Until then I think it best we stay apart.’ She turned and sped down the hill, Nathan’s pleas for her to come back ringing in her ears.