A Family Affair Page 5

  Ned smiled when he saw Clover. He had already taken off the sailcloth coverings at the wing-tips, ready for extending the wingspan.

  ‘So what do you want me to do, Ned?’

  ‘I want you to cover in the fuselage behind where I sit,’ he told her. ‘There’s no advantage in leaving it open like a frame. Enclosing it can provide storage space and protect the control wires to the tail and rudder.’

  ‘All right.’ She set about measuring up for the first piece.

  ‘Look, here’s the model. It’s nearly finished already. What do you think?’

  ‘It looks a bit different to the first flying machine you made,’ she said fingering the tail. ‘It’s less like a box kite.’

  He grinned with satisfaction. ‘And it’ll perform better than any box kite design.’

  She smiled at him with admiration. He was so engrossed in his machine and how he could make it fly. His determination was formidable. Nothing would deter him from his goal. Oh, he would succeed, of that she was certain. He read every scrap of information there was to read about the progress of other aviators all over the world and utilised their best ideas.

  Clover moved to the trestle table and rolled out the expensive canvas sailcloth. She measured it and marked it out with a piece of blue chalk, then began cutting with a huge pair of scissors. Meanwhile Ned sawed and sanded the lath of wood that was to become an extended spar on one of the wings and offered it up to the construction. They worked companionably, speaking little, while Clover’s thoughts were about Tom Doubleday and whether he was supposed to be meeting Ramona that evening.

  It depressed her to think about it. Ramona and Tom Doubleday…What if she got pregnant and he had to marry her?

  If only he had asked her, Clover, to be his, she would be the happiest girl in the world. Oh, she was not without admirers, that much was obvious. Often she caught men looking at her covetously in the Jolly Collier when she was helping to serve. Men looked at her in church on a Sunday, they ogled her at the foundry. When she was walking to work she would attract many a wolf whistle. Yet no other man had really appealed. Nobody had ever made her stomach churn like Tom Doubleday. She’d never looked at a man’s lips before and known she wanted, more than anything, to be kissed by them. She’d never looked at a man’s hands and wondered what sensations they would elicit if they explored her body. She’d lain in bed at night imagining it and all sorts of other very private things, and could not sleep for ages after because of it.

  The nearest thing she’d experienced to romance was Ned Brisco, but that was too one-sided to be any good for him. It was time to be honest with Ned, time to make him realise there could never be anything more than that which already existed between them. Some day, she would meet a man and fall head over heels in love; somebody other than Tom Doubleday who was occupying her thoughts now. Ned had to be prepared for that. It was only fair.

  ‘Why is it that you like me to spend my time here with you, Ned?’ she asked, breaking the concentration.

  Ned stopped what he was doing and turned round to face her. ‘That’s a funny question, Clover.’

  ‘But I’d really like to know.’

  ‘Well, because I enjoy your company, I suppose. It’s nice being with you. And because you help me a lot.’

  ‘You enjoy my company, you said. But you hardly ever speak while I’m here.’

  ‘I still enjoy your company, Clover. I feel comfortable with you. We don’t have to talk all the while.’

  ‘No, I suppose not,’ she answered softly.

  ‘What’s the matter, Clover? You sound real fed up.’ He sounded uneasy. ‘Aren’t you interested in the flying machine any more?’

  ‘’Course I am,’ she admitted. ‘I still want to see you succeed. I want to see the thing fly and know that I had a hand in it. But, as regards anything else…I mean us…you and me…we see each other here, yet we don’t talk much, you have to admit.’

  He sighed with dejection. ‘I admit I’m not such a brilliant conversationalist, Clover.’

  She smiled affectionately. She couldn’t help but like him. ‘Well you do seem to be limited to one topic…’

  ‘Yes, I know I’m a bit preoccupied with it. Sorry. It doesn’t mean I’m not interested in you, Clover. I think the world—’

  ‘So how would you feel if you saw me with another man?’ she asked straightforwardly. ‘Because if another man I liked asked me out and I liked him, I’d most likely go. I mean, it’s not as if you and me are courting or anything like that.’

  ‘No,’ he said and she perceived his dejection. ‘I agree, it’s not as if we’re courting. I had hoped though, when—’

  ‘So it would be a mistake for you to regard me as anything other than a friend –wouldn’t it? Even though plenty folk think we’re more than just friends.’

  He shrugged again disappointedly. ‘So have you met somebody you like, Clover? Is that why you mention it?’

  ‘No, no. I haven’t met anybody, Ned. But I might. And if I do, I don’t want you to think that I…I don’t want you to think you have any claim on me. On the other hand, I’d hate you to think I don’t care anything for our friendship, ’cause I do. ’Cause that’s what we are – friends.’

  ‘Yes, we are friends, Clover. I’d like us to be more than that but…Dammit, I might as well say it, since we’re talking about it…I’m in love with you, Clover. Always have been. All right, I know you’re not in love with me, so…’ He shrugged again and turned back to the wing he was modifying. ‘Well, at least we work well together, don’t we?’

  Clover’s twentieth birthday came and went and no great fuss made. She was privately delighted when she received a birthday card from Tom Doubleday which she secreted away in her bedroom away from Ramona’s prying eyes. She had a lovely new white two-piece summer dress made at Bessie Roberts’s. It had a high-necked bodice and pouched in front; she chose the style and paid for it herself. Mary Ann gave her a new prayer book, Jake handed her a sovereign to spend as she wished, and Ramona bought her a new parasol for the summer.

  The new dress re-exposed a recent bone of contention that Clover had hoped was buried for good: to Mary Ann’s reaffirmed dismay, Clover still refused to wear a corset to pull in her waist. She insisted that her waist was small enough at twenty-four inches, so she didn’t need a corset. ‘Brazen faggot,’ her mother called her. ‘Wait till you’ve had kids and you’m my age and it all starts to puff out like a bladder full of wind,’ she told her. But Clover perceived some humour in her mother’s eyes. Perhaps envy, too, that she herself could not be so brazen as to face the world corsetless, especially as her younger husband was fond of patting her rock-hard backside, when he might well have preferred patting untrussed feminine flesh that yielded more temptingly to the touch. Ramona, too, embraced Clover’s attitude to corsets. It made perfect sense not to constrict your movements and make yourself uncomfortable and hot, especially now that summer was coming. In any case, at work she was bending down so much, reaching for bottles on low shelves, stretching up for glasses and spirit bottles. It was bad enough having to wear all the uncomfortable things a woman was expected to wear, let alone corsets. Besides, Ramona’s waist measured only twenty-three inches, so she needed a corset even less than Clover, being so petite. So corsets they did not wear and, since corsets were not a fit topic for discussion at the meal table in any case, the subject was finally abandoned.

  Whitsun came and went in days of perpetual sunshine and the scaled-down model of Ned’s flying machine proved to be a big attraction in Buffery Park on the Sunday, watched by a gathering clutch of highly curious Sunday afternoon walkers. He carried out the modifications he deemed necessary the same evening and put them to the test next day, to the delight of a chattering of children who were astonished, and a group of grey old men whom nothing would surprise. It only remained to incorporate these changes into the full-scale biplane he had almost finished constructing.

  Tom Doubleday, Clover knew, called in at the J
olly Collier two or three times a week nowadays, but since it always coincided with her return from work when she looked her shabbiest she seldom spoke to him. Occasionally, he would spot her drifting through the passage but there was no opportunity for conversation. And besides, she did not want to antagonise Ramona.

  Apart from one or two days of squally rain early in June that left the uneven cobbled streets of Kates Hill dotted with inky puddles, the weather became more settled again. Ramona enjoyed her eighteenth birthday and she, too, had a card from Tom Doubleday which she kept in her room away from Clover’s prying eyes. Her father bought her a new accordion.

  A new copper boiler with a capacity of six hundred and fifty gallons was installed in the brewery along with a larger mash tun. But Jake could make full use of neither yet; three more fermentation vessels were required to give them the capacity they needed. Lack of capital was proving to be the problem and his house remained unsold, making matters worse. Mary Ann seriously distrusted all banks so, out of respect for his new wife’s wishes, Jake was reluctant to apply to one for a loan. However, some progress had been made, inasmuch as several outlets had signed up to take deliveries of Beckitt’s Beers, as the products were being branded.

  It was time for Jake to implement his back-up plan.

  On the evening of Wednesday, 5th June, he left the Jolly Collier’s customers in the care of Mary Ann, Ramona and Clover while he headed for the Dudley Arms Hotel in the Market Place. The Dudley Arms was where Elijah Tandy lived, enjoying his wealth in lordly fashion, in a fine room that offered him easy access to all the card schools in the town. As a soldier Elijah had served unscathed under Kitchener, first in the Boer War from 1899 to 1902, and in India during 1903 and 1904 and had seen something of life. He had returned from India somewhat better off than when he’d departed, thanks to a skill he had acquired during countless off-duty hours playing poker. Nowadays, Jake often referred to him as the Nabob. Since his soldiering, he had done little other than gamble successfully. Jake considered that the time had come for Elijah to make himself useful and be a more responsible citizen.

  He found him in his room, fastening a collar to his shirt in front of the mirror.

  ‘Off out, our Elijah?’

  ‘A spot of courting.’

  ‘Can you spare me half an hour before you go? I doubt if Dorcas will mind.’

  ‘Why, what’s up?’

  ‘The brewery, Elijah. I was counting on having sold the house by now and the money from that subsidising the expansion of the business a bit further. Well, it ain’t sold, as you know and we need money for more fermentation squares. Otherwise we can’t get no further forward. I wondered if you’d got a few hundred I could borrow meanwhile.’

  Elijah struggled with his collar stud but managed to attach the collar at the back. ‘This brewing business, Jake…Is it sound? I mean, is there money to be made?’

  ‘Sound? I should say it’s bloody sound. Already I’ve got off-licences and free houses clamouring to buy our stuff. You know what Mary Ann’s beer’s like – it’s beautiful. The blokes love it. Then there’s the ironworks we could supply. Have no fear, Elijah, your money would be safe enough.’

  Elijah pondered while he tied his necktie. ‘I ain’t so sure as I want to lend you money, Jake,’ he said at last and noted the disappointment that registered on his brother’s face. ‘But I’ll come into the business as a partner, if you’ll have me. And I’ll put money in.’

  Jake’s face lit up. ‘And you’re welcome, our Elijah. Do you fancy getting stuck in with the graft like the rest of us then?’

  ‘I don’t mind getting me hands dirty, our Jake. Anyroad, it’s time I did something worthwhile instead of farting about in card schools.’

  ‘Then it makes sense to come and live at the Jolly Collier, eh? After all, you couldn’t live here still when the place belongs to a rival brewery. And we’ve got a spare bedroom. We could soon get it ready for you.’

  Elijah adjusted his necktie in the mirror, but looked thoughtful. ‘There’s just one small consideration, Jake…’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘Dorcas.’

  ‘Oh. Are you getting wed at last then?’

  ‘Me wed? You’re kidding, mate. I ain’t about to get wed. But I do like to claim me conjugal rights from time to time.’

  ‘Oh, I see…’ Jake looked pensive.

  ‘There is one way we could solve it, Jake…’

  Jake looked up at him hopefully. ‘How?’

  ‘By you allowing me to use your house a couple of nights a week for me courting. They turn a blind eye here when Dorcas comes back to me room at night, but I can’t see Mary Ann turning a blind eye at the Jolly Collier, can you?’

  Jake shook his head. ‘Not likely. Besides, there’s the two girls…’

  ‘As you say, there’s the two girls,’ Elijah agreed.

  ‘Well, I’ve got no objection to you using my old bed to get your wicked away a couple of nights a week, our Elijah. Far be it from me to get in the way of that. In fact, I’ll call in meself and get it all made up for you.’

  Elijah smiled. ‘Let’s go down to the bar and have a drink on it then, eh?’

  ‘It’s all settled then?’

  ‘It’s all settled. How much money do you want off me, our Jake?’

  ‘Let’s say a thousand for now if you can spare it. We’ll have a deed of partnership drawn up, legal like, and agree later the final figure. Wait till I tell Mary Ann. She’ll be beside herself.’

  ‘With joy or despair?’

  Jake laughed. ‘You can never tell just by looking. But she’s all right. I wouldn’t swap her for crock of gold.’

  Chapter 4

  On 10th June, a Monday, Clover and Ned walked back to Kates Hill together from the Coneygree. Whichever route they took they had a steep uphill climb at some point. Today, they decided to take the Bunns Lane route.

  ‘Did you read about that attempt in France yesterday to fly?’ Ned asked as they ambled past the Bunns Lane brick works on their left.

  ‘No, tell me about it.’

  ‘Some chap called Alberto Santos-Dumont. Yesterday, on its first test flight he wrecked some weird concoction of aeroplane and airship he’d put together.’

  ‘That’s a shame,’ Clover commented. ‘Just think of all the work he must’ve put into it, if what you do is anything to go by.’

  ‘Well I don’t feel sorry for him, Clover,’ Ned said trenchantly and slung his knapsack onto his other shoulder to underline his point. ‘Serves him right for not sticking to one configuration. He tried his luck first with a biplane he’d built in March and that didn’t work. So he cobbles together this latest daft combination and that don’t work either. Well, I ain’t surprised. Now he’s said he’s going to try and fly with a monoplane arrangement. Why don’t he make his mind up?’

  ‘You mean he should try and master one thing at a time?’

  ‘It’s obvious. We know biplanes’ll fly ’cause the Wright Brothers have flown ’em. Why didn’t he just stick with his biplane and try to master that shape? That’s the trouble with the Continentals. They keep hiving off in different directions. I bet any money I’ll fly sooner than they do – and further.’

  The exertion of brisk uphill walking in the warm muggy evening air made them both hot and they were at the point in Watson’s Green Road, by the wooden cowsheds of Roseland Farm that reeked of farm animals, where the climb started to get steep.

  ‘If the weather stays fine this weekend I want to try and fly the Gull.’ The Gull was the name he had given to this, his new biplane. ‘It’s as good as ready, Clover, and Amos can borrow the horse and cart again so we can transport it.’

  ‘Are you going over Rough Hill again?’ she asked.

  ‘It’s the best hill facing south-west. And not much in the way of trees if I come down a bit sudden. Shall you come?’

  ‘’Course I’ll come. You don’t think I’m going to miss it after all the hours I’ve put in, do you?’ She l
aughed and pushed her hair away from her forehead that was bearing a sheen of perspiration.

  ‘I’m ever so confident it’ll fly, Clover, I’m thinking of inviting the Dudley Herald to send a reporter. I want local factory owners to take an interest. I want the world to know about my efforts.’

  ‘Good idea,’ she said enthusiastically. ‘You deserve some recognition for all the work you’ve put in.’

  ‘That’s what I thought. Even the French get loads of publicity and they generally fall on their arses. What are you doing tonight, Clover?’

  ‘I’m going to stay in tonight. I’ve got some ironing to do.’

  ‘I just wondered if you fancied going out with me…If you’re going to be busy though, it don’t matter.’

  They reached the Junction Inn with its rounded façade, said cheerio and parted. Holding her coat by the loop with which she hung it up, she flung it over her shoulder and walked briskly down Cromwell Street. She was hungry and wanted her tea. She hoped it would be ready when she arrived home. As she reached the bottom of Cromwell Street, she could see the rotund figure of Zillah Bache in her long skirt ambling towards her in George Street. She waved and smiled and Clover crossed the road at Brown Street to intercept her.

  ‘I’m just on me way home,’ Zillah announced. ‘It’s warm, int it?’

  ‘It is warm,’ Clover agreed. ‘Too warm. What’s for my tea, Zillah? I’m famished.’

  ‘I’n done yer a nice meat-and-tater pie, my babby.’

  ‘Ooh, lovely.’

  ‘It’ll be in the oven at the side of the grate. The others’n had theirs.’

  As she made to continue her journey, Clover noticed a solitary bottle of beer frothing in Zillah’s basket; her daily reward for not helping herself. ‘I’d better go, Zillah. I don’t want anybody else pinching my pie. See you tomorrow.’

  ‘I er…heard your mother and that Jake talkin’ today, Clover…’

  ‘Oh?’ Clover checked herself.