1911–
Caroline’s last child was born in 1911, long after the occupants of Storton Manor had given up hope of there being a Calcott heir. There had been other pregnancies, two of them, both a long time in the conceiving, but Caroline’s body had rejected the children and they had been lost before they even really began. The little girl was born in August. It was a long, hot summer the likes of which no one could remember, and Caroline sweltered, shuffling into the garden to lie swollen and prone in the shade, drowsing. The heat was such that sometimes, as she hovered on the edges of sleep, she imagined herself back in Woodward County, sitting on the porch and gazing out at the yard, waiting for Corin to ride home; so that when she was approached by a servant or her husband, she stared at them in no little confusion for a while, before remembering who they were and where she was.
The gardens were scorched and brown. A village boy, Tommy Westenfell, drowned in the dew pond. His feet got tangled in weeds at the bottom and he was found hours later by his distraught father; pale, still, and sleepy-eyed. Mrs. Priddy took a bad turn walking back from the butcher with a whole leg of lamb and was consigned to her bed for three days, her skin mottled and puce. Estelle and Liz, Cass’s plump replacement, worked hard to cover for her, with perspiration soaking their uniforms. The smell everywhere was of parched earth, sweat and hot, dry air. The stone flags of the terrace burnt Caroline’s feet through the soles of her slippers. Henry Calcott, who was by then uncomfortable around his own wife, remained at home long enough to see the child safely born, and then quit Wiltshire to stay with friends by the sea in Bournemouth.
The labor was long and arduous, and Caroline was delirious by the end. The doctor forced fluids into her through a tube pushed down her throat, and she gazed at him from the bed with uncomprehending terror. Liz and Estelle kept the baby those first few days, taking turns to lay cold cloths onto their mistress’s skin to cool her. Caroline recovered, at length, but when they brought the child to her, her gaze swept over it impassively, and then she turned her face away and would not nurse it. A wet nurse was found in the village and Caroline, who wanted to be sure that the girl would live before she dared to love her, found, as months and then years passed, that she had left it too late. The little girl did not seem to belong to her, and she could not love her. The child was two years old before she was given a name. Estelle, Liz and the wet nurse had been calling her Augusta all that time, but one day Caroline looked dispassionately into her cradle and announced that she would be named Meredith, after her grandmother.
Meredith was a lonely child. She had no siblings to play with and was forbidden to play with any of the village children that she saw roaming the fields and lanes around the manor house. The household was in decline by then, and the village of Barrow Storton was a sad, quiet place with most of the young men gone off to fight and die on the continent. Henry Calcott kept mainly to town, where his gambling consumed so much money that several of the staff, including Liz and the scullery maid, were laid off, leaving Mrs. Priddy to keep the house as best she could with only Estelle to help her. Mrs. Priddy was kind to Meredith, letting her eat the leftover pastry scraps and keep a pet rabbit in a pen outside the kitchen door, where she fed it carrot tops and ragged outer lettuce leaves. A tutor came, five mornings a week, to teach Meredith her letters, music, needlework and deportment. Meredith hated the lessons and the tutor both; and escaped into the garden as soon as she could.
But Meredith longed for her mother. Caroline was an otherworldly creature by then, who sat for hours in a white gown, either at a window or out on the lawn, staring into the distance and seeing who knew what. When Meredith tried to hug her, she tolerated it for a moment and then disentangled the child’s arms with a mild smile, telling her vaguely to run along and play. Mrs. Priddy admonished her not to tire her mother out, and Meredith took this instruction to heart, fearing that she was somehow responsible for her mother’s persistent lethargy. So she kept away, thinking that if she did her mother would not be so tired, and would get up and smile and love her more. She played alone, watching pigeons on the rooftops courting and bowing to one another. She watched the frog spawn in the ornamental pond slowly grow tails and hatch into tadpoles. She watched the kitchen cats as they chased down hapless mice and then devoured them with swift, perfunctory crunches. And she watched the Dinsdales in the clearing through the woods. She watched them whenever she could, but she was too shy to ever let them see her.
The Dinsdales had three children: a tiny baby who went around in a sling on his mother’s back, a little girl with yellow hair like her mother’s, who was a few years older than Meredith herself, and a boy, a dark, strange-looking boy whose age Meredith was unable to guess at, who went everywhere with his father and played with his little sister, grinning as he teased her. Their mother was pretty and she smiled all the time, laughing at their antics and hugging them. Their father was more serious, as Meredith understood fathers should be, but he smiled often too, and put his arm around the boy, or lifted the little girl high into the air to sit astride his shoulders. Meredith could not imagine her own father ever doing such a thing with her—the very thought made her uneasy. So Meredith watched this family, fascinated, and even though they were happy and bright she came away from her clandestine visits feeling tearful and dark, unaware that she watched them because she envied them and was filled with yearning for her own mother to hug her that way.
One day she made a mistake. Her mother was on the lawn in her wicker chair, an untouched jug of lemonade on the table beside her with thirsty flies settling unafraid on the beaded lace cover. Meredith emerged from the woods and was startled to see her there, immediately brushing down her skirts and tucking her hair behind her ears. Her mother did not look up as she approached, but managed a wan smile once her daughter was standing right in front of her.
“Well, child, and where have you been today?” her mother asked her in a voice that was soft and dry and seemed to come from far away. Meredith went right up to her and tentatively took hold of her hand.
“I was in the woods. Exploring,” she said. “Shall I pour you some lemonade?”
“And what did you find in the woods?” her mother asked, ignoring the offer of lemonade.
“I saw the Dinsdales—” Meredith said, and then put her hand over her mouth. Mrs. Priddy had warned her never to mention the Dinsdales to her mother, although she had no idea why not.
“You did what?” her mother snapped. “You know that’s not allowed! I hope you have not been talking to those people?”
“No, Mama,” Meredith said quietly. Her mother settled back into her chair, pressing her mouth into a bloodless line. Meredith steeled herself. “But, Mama, why can I not play with them?” Her heart beat fast at her own temerity.
“Because they are filth! Gypsy, tinker villains! They are thieves and liars and they are not welcome here—and you are not to go near them! Not ever! Do you understand?” Her mother leant forward in her chair like a whip cracking, and grasped Meredith’s wrist so that it hurt. Meredith nodded fearfully.
“Yes, Mama,” she whispered.
They are not welcome here. Meredith took these words to heart. When she watched them next her envy became jealousy, and instead of wanting to play with them, and share their happy existence, she began to wish instead that they did not have their happy existence. She watched them every day, and every day she grew crosser with them, and sadder inside, so that it came to seem to her that it was the Dinsdales who were making her sad. Her and her mother both. If she could make them go away, she thought, her mother would be pleased. Surely, she would have to be pleased.
On a hot summer’s day in 1918, Meredith heard the Dinsdale children playing at the dew pond. She edged closer, through the dappled light beneath the trees, then stood behind the smooth trunk of a beech and watched them jumping in and out of the water. It looked like tremendous fun, although Meredith had never been swimming so she could not know for sure. She wished she could try, though. Her skin was itchy with the heat, and the thought of all that clear, cold water washing over it was so tempting it made her weak. The Dinsdales were splashing up arcs of crystalline droplets, and Meredith noticed how dry her mouth felt. The boy’s skin was so much darker than his sister’s. It was a kind of nut color, and his raggedy hair was inky black. He teased the girl and dunked her under the water, but Meredith saw that he secretly watched her and made sure she was still laughing before he dunked her again.
She leant out for a better view, and then froze to the spot. The Dinsdales had seen her. First the boy, who had climbed out and was standing on the bank, water streaming from the hems of his short breeches, then the girl, who paddled in a circle to see what her brother was looking at.
“Hello,” the boy said to her, so casual and friendly, when Meredith felt like her heart might explode in her chest. “Who are you?”
Meredith was amazed that he didn’t know, when she herself felt that she knew them so well. It outraged her that they did not know who she was. She stood, stock still and breathless, not knowing whether to stay or to run.
“Meredith,” she whispered, after a long, uneasy silence.
“I’m Maria!” the girl called from the water, her arms windmilling madly beneath the surface.
“And I’m Flag. Do you want to come in for a swim? It’s quite safe,” the boy told her. He put his hands on his hips and examined her, head tipped to one side. His wet skin shone over the curves of his arms and legs, and liquid light from the water danced in his eyes. Meredith felt almost too shy to answer him. She thought him beautiful, and was not sure what to say.
“What kind of name is Flag?” she asked, haughtily, in spite of herself.
“My name,” he shrugged. “Do you live at the big house, then?”
“Yes,” she replied, her words still reluctant to come.
“Well,” Flag continued, after a pause, “do you want to swim with us or not?”
Meredith felt her face burn and she tipped her chin down to hide. She was not allowed to swim. She never had been—but the temptation was so strong and, she reasoned, who would ever find out?
“I . . . I don’t know how to swim,” she was forced to admit.
“Paddle then. I’ll fetch you out if you fall in,” Flag shrugged. Meredith had never heard the word paddle before, but she thought she understood. Fingers trembling with the illicit thrill of disobedience, she sat down on the cracked earth and pulled off her boots, then crept carefully to the water’s edge. It wasn’t really disobeying, she told herself. Nobody had ever said anything to her about not paddling.
She slithered the last few inches down the steep bank and gasped nervously as her feet stumbled into the water.
“It’s so cold!” she squeaked, hastily scrambling backwards. Maria giggled.
“It’s only cold when you first jump in. Then it’s perfect!” she said.
Meredith edged forward again and let the water rise to her ankles. The bite of it made her bones ache and scattered silvery shivers all over her. With a yell, Flag took a short run up and leapt into the middle of the pool, bending his knees and wrapping his arms around them. The splash caused a wave to engulf Maria and soak the bottom six inches of Meredith’s dress.
“Now look what you’ve done!” she cried, afraid that Mrs. Priddy or her mother would see and she would be found out.
“Flag! Don’t,” Maria told him gaily as he surfaced, spluttering.
“It’ll soon dry out,” Flag told her carelessly. His hair was plastered to his neck, as slick as otter fur. Meredith climbed out crossly, sat down on the bank and studied her feet, which had gone from pink to bright white after their wetting.
“Flag—say you’re sorry!” Maria commanded.
“Sorry for getting your dress wet, Meredith,” Flag said, rolling his eyes at his sister. But Meredith didn’t reply. She sat and watched them swim for a while longer, but her sullen presence seemed to spoil their fun and they soon climbed out and pulled on the rest of their clothes.
“Do you want to come and have tea?” Maria asked her, her smile a little less ready than before. Flag stood half turned to go. Water ran from his hair and wet his shirt, slicking it to his skin. Meredith wanted to look at him but her eyes slid away infuriatingly when she tried.
She shook her head. “I’m not allowed,” she said.
“Come on then, Maria,” Flag said, a touch impatiently.
“Goodbye, then,” Maria shrugged, and gave Meredith a little wave.
It took nearly two hours for the thick cotton of her dress to dry out completely, and during that time Meredith kept to the outer edges of the garden where only the gardener might see her. He was ancient and didn’t pay much attention to anything except his marrows. She thought about her paddle, and about Maria inviting her to tea, and about Flag’s wet hair shining, and each of these things gave her a fizzing feeling quite at odds with the resentment she had felt before. It made her skip a little and smile excitedly. She imagined how it might be to go to tea, to see the inside of the covered wagon that she had watched so many times from the trees, to meet their blonde and affectionate mother, who put her arms around them and smiled all the time. How do you do, Mrs. Dinsdale? She practiced the phrase under her breath in the safe, silent confines of the greenhouse. But there could be no arguing that this would be a huge disobedience. And that talking to Flag and Maria had been one as well, even if she could argue her way around the paddling. Just thinking about what would happen if Mama found out about it brought her spirits low again, and when she was called in for tea she made sure that she was quiet and dull and gave nothing away.
For days, Meredith was consumed with thoughts and daydreams about the Dinsdales. She had so rarely encountered other children—only visiting cousins, or the children of other guests who stayed only fleetingly so she never really got to know them. She knew she was supposed to despise the tinkers, and she knew all the things her mother had told her about them, and she still longed more than anything to please her mother and to make her happy, but the idea of having friends was irresistible. A week later, she was playing in the barred shadow of the tall iron gates when she saw Flag and Maria walking along the lane toward the village. They would not see her unless she called out and for a second she was paralysed, torn between longing to speak to them again and knowing that she shouldn’t—least of all from the gate, which was visible from the house if anybody happened to be at one of the east-facing windows. In desperation she came up with a compromise of sorts and burst loudly into song—the first thing that came to mind, a song she had heard Estelle singing as she pegged the laundry out to dry.
“I’d like to see the Kaiser, with a lily in his hand!” she bellowed, tunelessly, hopping from one bar of shadow to the next. Flag and Maria turned and, seeing her, came over to the gates.
“Hello again,” Maria greeted her. “What are you doing?”
“Nothing,” Meredith replied, her heart yammering behind her ribs. “What are you doing?”
“Going on to the village to buy bread and Bovril for tea. Do you want to come too? If we can get a broken loaf, there’ll be a ha’penny left to buy sweets,” Maria smiled.
“Not necessarily,” Flag qualified. “If there’s enough left over we’re to buy butter, remember?”
“Oh, but there’s never enough for butter as well!” Maria dismissed her brother.
“You have to go to the shops yourselves?” Meredith asked, puzzled.
“Of course, silly! Who else would go?” Maria laughed.
“Suppose you’ve got servants to run around buying your tea, haven’t you?” Flag asked, a touch derisively.
Meredith bit her lip, an awkward blush heating her face. She hardly ever went into the village. A handful of times she had accompanied Mrs. Priddy or Estelle on some errand, but only when her father was away, and her mother laid low and guaranteed not to hear of it.
“Do you want to come, then?”
“I’m not allowed,” Meredith said unhappily. Her cheeks burned even more, and Flag tilted his head at her, a mischievous glint coming into his eye.
“Seems to be a fair bit you’re not allowed to do,” he remarked.
“Hush! It’s not her fault!” Maria admonished him.
“Come on—I dare you. Or maybe you’re just scared?” he asked, arching an eyebrow.
Meredith glared at him defiantly. “I am not! Only . . .” She hesitated. She was scared, it was true. Scared of being found out, scared of her mother’s lightning-fast temper. But it would be so easy to slip away and back again without being noticed. Only the worst luck would mean she was discovered in this outrageous behavior.
“Cowardy, cowardy custard!” Flag sang softly.
“Don’t listen to him,” Maria advised her. “Boys are stupid.” But Meredith was listening, and she did want to impress this black-eyed boy, and she did want to be friends with his sister, and she did want to be as free as they were, to come and go, and to buy sweets in the village and bread for tea. The gates of Storton Manor seemed to rear up above her head, ever higher and starker. Jangling with nerves, she reached for the latch, pulled open a narrow gap and slipped out into the lane.
Flag strode on ahead, leaving Maria and Meredith to walk side by side, picking wild flowers from the hedgerows and firing questions to and fro—what was it like living in a caravan, what was it like living in a mansion, how many servants were there and what were their names and why didn’t Meredith go to school, and what was school like and what did they do there? In the village they stopped at the door to the farrier’s shed to watch as he pressed a hot iron shoe onto the foot of a farm horse, whose hooves were the size of dinner plates. Clouds of acrid smoke billowed past them, but the horse did not blink an eye.
“Doesn’t it hurt him?” Meredith asked.
“ ’Course not. No more than it hurts you to have your hair cut,” Flag shrugged.
“Get on with ye, casting shadows o’er the work,” said the farrier, who was old and grizzled and stern of eye, so they carried on toward the grocer’s. They bought a broken loaf and a jar of Bovril, and even though there was only enough left for two small sugar mice, the lady behind the counter smiled at Meredith and gave them a third.
“Not often we see you in the village, Miss Meredith,” the lady said, and Meredith caught her breath. How did the woman know who she was? And would she tell Mrs. Priddy? Her face went pale and panicked tears came hotly into her eyes. “Now, now. Don’t look so aghast! Your secret’s safe with me,” the woman said.
“Thank you, Mrs. Carter!” Maria called brightly, and they went outside to devour their sweets.
“Why aren’t you allowed to go into the village? No harm could come to you,” Flag asked as they stopped by the pond to watch the ducks circling idly. They sat down on the grass and Meredith nibbled at her sugar mouse, determined to make it last. She so rarely had sweets.
“Mama says it’s not seemly,” Meredith replied.
“What’s seemly?” Maria asked, licking her fingers with relish. Meredith shrugged.
“It means she’s too good to go mixing with the hoi polloi. The likes of us,” Flag said, sounding amused. The girls thought about this for a while, in meditative silence.
“So . . . what would happen if your ma found out you was along here with us, then?” Maria asked at length.
“I would be . . . told off,” Meredith said uncertainly. In fact, she had no real idea. She had been told off for even watching the Dinsdales. Now she had sneaked out of the gardens and come into the village with them, and talked to them lots, and been seen in the grocer’s by a woman who knew her name, and it had all been wonderful. Painfully, she swallowed the last of her sugar mouse, which had lost all its sweetness. “I should go back,” she said nervously, scrambling to her feet. As if sensing the change in mood, the Dinsdales got up without argument and they began to walk back along the lane.
At the gates, Meredith slithered back through the gap as quickly as she could and pulled the gate closed, not daring to look up at the house in case somebody was watching. Her blood was racing and only once the gate was shut did she feel a little safer. She held on to the bars for support while she got her breath back.
“You’re an odd one and no mistake,” Flag said, with a bemused smile.
“Come and have some tea with us tomorrow,” Maria invited her. “Ma said you can—I asked her already.”
“Thank you. But . . . I don’t know,” Meredith said. She was feeling exhausted by her adventure and could hardly think of anything except getting away from the gates without being seen talking to them. The Dinsdales wandered off and Meredith put her face to the bars to watch them go, pressing the cold metal into her skin. Flag pulled a leggy stem of goose grass from the hedge and stuck it to the back of Maria’s blouse, and the blonde girl twisted and craned her neck, trying to reach it. As they passed out of sight Meredith turned and saw her mother standing in the upstairs hall window, watching her. Behind the glass, her face was ghastly pale and her eyes far too wide. She looked like a specter, frozen for ever in torment.
Meredith’s heart seemed to stop, and at once she thought desperately about running away to the furthest part of the garden. But that would only make matters worse, she realized in a moment of cold clarity. She suddenly needed to pee and thought for a hideous second that she would wet herself. On trembling legs she made her slow progress into the house, up the stairs and along the corridor to where her mother was waiting.
“How dare you?” Caroline whispered. Meredith looked at her feet. Her silence seemed to enrage her mother further. “How dare you!” she shouted, so loudly and harshly that Meredith jumped, and began to cry. “Answer me—where have you been with them? What were you doing?” Mrs. Priddy appeared from a room down the hall and hurried along to stand behind Meredith protectively.
“My lady? Is something the matter?” the housekeeper asked, diffidently.
Caroline ignored her. She bent forward, seized Meredith’s shoulders and shook her roughly.
“Answer me! How dare you disobey me, girl!” she spat, her gaunt face made brutal by rage. Meredith sobbed harder, tears of pure fear running down her cheeks. Straightening up, Caroline took a short breath that flared her nostrils whitely. She measured her daughter briefly, then slapped her sharply across the face.
“My lady! That’s enough!” Mrs. Priddy gasped. Meredith fell into shocked silence, her eyes fixed on the front of her mother’s skirts and not daring to move from there. Caroline grasped her arm again and towed her viciously to her room, pushing her inside so abruptly that Meredith stumbled.
“You will stay in there and not come out until you have learnt your lesson,” Caroline said coldly. Meredith wiped her nose and felt her face throbbing where her mother had hit her. “You’re a wicked child. No mother could ever love you,” Caroline said; and the last thing Meredith saw before the door closed was Mrs. Priddy’s stunned expression.
For a week, Meredith was kept locked in her room. The staff were given orders that she was to have nothing but bread and water, but once Caroline had retired, Estelle and Mrs. Priddy took her biscuits and scones and ham sandwiches. They brushed her hair for her, told her funny stories, and put arnica cream on her lip where the slap had made it swell, but Meredith remained silent and closed off, so that they exchanged worried looks above her head. No mother could ever love her. Meredith dwelt on this statement for a long time and refused to believe it. She would make her mother love her, she resolved. She would prove that she was not wicked, she would strive to be good and obedient and decorous in all things, and would win her mother’s heart that way. And she would shun the tinkers. Because of them, her mother could not love her. They are not welcome here. She lay listlessly on her bed and felt her old anger at the Dinsdales, her old resentment, well up into a stifling pall that cast a dark shadow over her heart.