Inherit the Skies Read online

  ‘As always.’

  ‘We are in business together. And this is a time of crisis.’

  ‘Hmm!’ she snorted. ‘And don’t you think we have a crisis in our marriage when you never pay the slightest consideration to my feelings?’

  He loosened his tie so that it hung in a black ribbon beneath the stiff white collar of his shirt.

  ‘You are behaving like a child.’

  ‘All you ever think of is business! You seem to forget that it is thanks to me that you are a part of it.’

  A muscle moved in his cheek. ‘Oh no, I could hardly forget that. And I really don’t know what you are complaining about. You got what you wanted, after all.’

  She began to tremble again, a tremor of cold fury. ‘What do you mean by that?’

  His face was hard, his eyes very cold. ‘I married you, didn’t I?’

  The fury exploded. Her fingers tightened on the handle of the brush, she turned and with one swift movement flung it at him. It caught him on the cheek, rebounded and fell, knocking over a small china ornament.

  ‘Bastard!’ she screamed.

  His eyes narrowed. He raised a hand to the sharp stinging spot. She stood up, hands clenched, eyes blazing.

  ‘Oh yes, you married me.’ Her voice was low and trembling. ‘And much good has it done me. Do you think I don’t know how it is with you? That I don’t know who it is you would prefer to be married to? Do you think I don’t see the way you look at her? I’d be a fool not to see! But is that all you do, Adam – look? Or is there another reason besides business which keeps you away from me – stops you from wanting me. Is she satisfying you? Is that what it is?’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous!’

  She tossed her head. ‘ Not so ridiculous, Adam. I know Sarah of old. She has the morals of an alleycat.’

  He took a step towards her. She thought he was going to strike her. She stood her ground, eyes glittering with all her accumulated disappointments and years of hatred and resentment of the girl who had always been a thorn in her flesh.

  ‘Oh yes, I am afraid it is true, Adam. Perhaps you don’t know why your precious Sarah was sent away from Chewton Leigh as a girl. I’m sure you don’t – she wouldn’t have been likely to tell you. But I will. She seduced my brother. Lawrence found her with Hugh, rolling in the hay like a common whore. Which of course is exactly what her mother was. Like mother, like daughter.’

  His hands shot out, imprisoning her wrists. ‘Alicia!’ His tone was threatening. She threw back her head and laughed.

  ‘True, all true. Has Sarah mentioned her father to you? No – I’m sure she hasn’t. She doesn’t know who he is – and neither did her mother, I should think. So you see the girl you put on a pedestal does not exist. She never has. And for her, for this trollop, you are ruining our marriage!’

  He was still gripping her wrists so hard that his fingers raised red weals in the white skin but there was a dazed expression in his eyes as if he had been struck in the face by a brick. She laughed again, lips parting to show her teeth, head thrown back so that her raven hair cascaded over the ivory peignoir, her throat stretched long and creamy and her breasts thrust enticingly against the silk and lace.

  ‘Oh Adam, don’t waste your time. Not now, when it is so short.’

  For a moment longer his fingers bit into her wrists then with a movement so swift it startled her he drew her to him. His mouth came down on hers, choking off her laughter, his teeth raking her lips. The smell of the whisky on his breath mingled with the scent of honeysuckle wafting through the open window in her nostrils and the old familiar desire rose in her, blotting out anger and despair in a tide of passion. Roughly his hands tore away the silk and lace so that her body was exposed, smooth and creamy in the moonlight.

  Briefly he towered over her, divesting himself of his clothes and she lay waiting in an agony of delight. Then his weight was upon her and within her and she gloried in the union with the one man who could truly dominate her, body and soul.

  All too soon it was over. For a few minutes he lay beside her then he levered himself up and rose from the bed, gathering his clothes from where he had dropped them. She wanted to protest, to beg him to stay, to sleep with her tonight at least in her bed and be there beside her when she woke in the morning. But no words came and she lay helplessly, passion and anger spent.

  In the doorway he paused, looking back at her, at the whiteness of her body and her raven hair spread out across the pillow.

  ‘Goodnight, Alicia.’

  There was a finality in the words. He might have been saying goodbye.

  The door closed after him and she was alone. Tears of frustration ached in her throat but her eyes were hot and dry.

  Somewhere in the stillness of the night a clock struck twelve.

  Chapter Thirty

  War fever gripped Chewton Leigh as it gripped the rest of the country. As Gilbert had feared some of the best of his workforce rushed off, young and keen, to join the queues at the recruiting offices which had been hastily set up and Eric decided to follow Adam’s lead and volunteer for the RFC.

  ‘You will be able to manage while I am away won’t you?’ he said to Sarah. ‘ It’s not as if you are miles from family and friends. And anyway, they say if we make a concerted effort the war could be over by Christmas.’

  ‘I think that’s a bit optimistic,’ Sarah said doubtfully. ‘Of course I shall be all right. The question is – will you?’

  ‘Oh, I expect so,’ Eric said breezily. ‘You know me, Sarah. I have the luck of the very Old Nick. And besides, I shall take good care of myself, knowing I have you and this young man to come home to.’ He ruffled Stephen’s tousled sandy head, smiling with pride. ‘You wouldn’t like to grow up thinking your daddy shirked his duty, would you, Stephen?’

  ‘I’m sure he would never think that,’ Sarah said a little sharply for she was suddenly filled with a dreadful feeling of desolation. Everyone, it seemed, was going to war. Adam, now Eric, and Hugh had already left for France with a composite regiment drawn from the various Guards Brigades. Not that she cared about Hugh, but his going had made all the other departures seem very real, very threatening. But Eric was right, of course. If he could best serve the war effort by being in uniform then it was only right that he should go. She would not have expected him to do otherwise. She could never have loved a man who was afraid to place himself in a little danger, and she certainly could not have married one, however kind and considerate he might be. ‘ Where do you think they will send you?’

  ‘I don’t know. We shall have to wait and see. But I hope it’s France. I quite fancy the idea of scouting over the German lines and I think Adam feels the same way.’

  Sarah turned away, busying herself with looking over the bowl of raspberries she had just picked from the bushes that grew against the south-facing wall of the garden. She still did not trust herself not to give away some hint of her feelings whenever Adam’s name was mentioned.

  ‘You’re fools, both of you,’ she said shortly. ‘Anyone would think this was some kind of game. Scouting over the German lines, indeed! It will be no more than you are asking for if they start taking pot shots at you!’

  Eric’s eyes twinkled. He seldom loved Sarah more than when she ‘got on her high horse’ as he described it.

  ‘I think we are both anxious to show Hugh the way modern methods can work,’ he told her. ‘He still thinks reconnaissance is the job of the cavalry. But the days of the horse on the battlefield are numbered.’

  ‘And a good thing too!’ Sarah said grimly. The Government had been requisitioning horses to reinforce the numbers of both the cavalry and the mounted wings of the infantry – many hunters from around Chewton Leigh had been taken already and she knew Alicia was living in fear that Baron would go too. Much as she hated Alicia, in this she had Sarah’s unbridled sympathy for as Sweet Lass’s foal Baron was the last link with her own beloved mare. ‘It’s horrible to think of horses being shot at and blown up
.’

  ‘And quite all right for men to suffer the same fate?’ Eric asked, amused.

  ‘At least they are there from choice, unlike the horses. And at least they understand what is happening to them.’ Sarah popped a raspberry into her mouth and held one out for Stephen.

  ‘I suppose you are right,’ Eric smiled and held out his hand. ‘Are those rationed or can I have one too?’ She passed him the bowl and he caught at her juice-stained hand. ‘Or maybe I could have a kiss, seeing I am going to France.’

  She glanced at Stephen who had returned to twirling his spinning top and smiled coquettishly. ‘Maybe you could – seeing you are going to France!’

  ‘Come here then, Mrs Gardiner and send a poor man happy to his death,’ he teased, pulling her into his arms. ‘Or at least with a memory to keep his resolve strong when faced with all those jolie mam’selles!’

  In the event neither Eric nor Adam were destined for France, for the time being at any rate. Instead Eric found himself sent to Brooklands, which Hugh Locke King had offered to the government the moment war was declared and which had quickly been designated an Aircraft Acceptance Park, whilst Adam was posted even closer to home – the Central Flying School at Upavon on Salisbury Plain. Both, though they did not admit it, felt vaguely cheated, both secretly envied Hugh, away in the thick of things.

  But Hugh’s days in France were numbered. After being plunged into combat almost at once Hugh’s company found themselves bound for Wytschaete where they were involved in fierce fighting during the last day of October and the first of November. When the battle was over both the CO and the Squadron Leader of the 1st Life Guards were numbered amongst the dead, many men had been wounded and many more taken prisoner. Hugh was amongst those who managed to return to the English camp in spite of having been wounded in the shoulder and knee, and after a brief spell in a field hospital in France where the shot was removed and a month in a London hospital he was sent home to Chewton Leigh to convalesce.

  Alicia, who had always been close to Hugh, set herself the task of nursing him and was glad of the diversion. The thing she had feared most had happened, the military had taken Baron in spite of all her efforts to make them think he was too highly strung for their needs, and with Adam away too she was desperate for something to take her mind off her loss. Nursing Hugh was exactly the tonic she needed. She quickly learned to dress his wounds and take care of his medications and she was quite prepared to sit with him while he talked of the horror of the battle, the therapy which was the best possible treatment to heal his mind, while Dr Haley – and nature – took care of his body. She was less happy to carry trays up and down the back stairs from the kitchen or light the fire to warm his room on the cold December mornings, but she did it all the same for the war had left them desperately short of servants. Bert, who had assisted Evans the butler had gone off to join the Somerset Light Infantry and Mabel the ’tween maid had given notice and gone off to work in a munitions factory. Alicia fervently hoped they would find replacements before long but Gilbert did not hold out much hope, and so Alicia took on the tasks in order to make her brother’s convalescence more comfortable.

  Christmas was fast approaching – the Christmas beyond which the pundits had prophesied the war would not last – but there was no sign of a speedy end to hostilities. Far from it, everything seemed to point to an embarrassing deadlock in France, where a continuous line of trenches now ran from the Swiss frontier to the sea. And always, it seemed, there was news of casualties. Several of the young men who had rushed into uniform leaving their jobs at the works would never be coming back – their photographs appeared in the evening paper under the banner headline ‘LOCAL HEROES DIE AT YPRES’ – and Will Bennett, son of the local postman, a stoker on the Audacious had been lost when the battleship was struck by a mine at the end of October.

  Naturally enough it was the contribution to the war effort of the newly formed air squadrons which aroused most interest at Chewton Leigh House for already Gilbert’s predictions that their part would not be limited to scouting and reconnaissance had proved accurate. At the end of September the Eastchurch Squadron of the RNAS had carried out a raid on airship sheds at Cologne and though they had been shot at from the ground they had returned virtually unscathed.

  A problem had arisen however – the Union Jacks that were painted on the tails of the aircraft could all too easily be mistaken for the German Iron Cross and a new identification had to be found to ensure the British guns did not attack their own.

  ‘I understand it is being replaced by a roundel,’ Gilbert told Lawrence over breakfast one morning. ‘Circles of red, white and blue that even a blind man could identify.’

  ‘Good idea …’ Lawrence broke off, clapping his hand over his mouth as one of his spasms of coughing overtook him and Blanche regarded them both with profound disapproval.

  ‘Do we have to talk about the war at breakfast? I must say I am becoming heartily sick of it. And Lawrence – that cough of yours is no better is it? Don’t you think it’s high time you saw Dr Haley and got something for it?’

  ‘I’m sorry …’ Lawrence managed between spasms.

  ‘Do something about it then! It is irritating, to say the least …’ She broke off as the door opened and Alicia came in. ‘Ah – Alicia, at last. I was beginning to think you had decided not to join us this morning.’

  Alicia glanced at her with dislike. She was wearing a plain dress of dark grey wool, very different from the flamboyant clothes that had once been her trademark, and her hair had been scraped up hastily rather than carefully arranged as it had used to be. As she served herself with coffee Blanche noticed with distaste that her fingers were grained with the marks of coaldust.

  ‘I have to attend to Hugh before I breakfast these days,’ she said coolly.

  Blanche’s lips tightened. ‘This shortage of servants is becoming intolerable.’

  Alicia ignored her, turning instead to Gilbert.

  ‘Father, I have been thinking. I am very glad to do what I can for Hugh but I am not sure it is enough. He was telling me last night about his friends – officers like him who have been wounded and need peace and quiet and country air to recover from their ordeal. But not all of them are as lucky as he is with a home like Chewton Leigh. I’d like to have some of them here.’

  A small frown puckered Gilbert’s forehead. A change had come over Alicia; even he, engrossed as he was in the business of running the works with all the increased pressures that war had brought, had not failed to notice it. Now, looking at her set and determined face, it struck him that she was not a happy young woman.

  ‘What exactly had you in mind?’ he enquired.

  ‘We have plenty of room. Perhaps we could offer some of them a place to convalesce.’

  ‘You mean turn Chewton Leigh into some kind of hospital?’ Blanche asked incredulously.

  ‘Not a hospital exactly. Obviously we couldn’t cope with men still in need of proper medical treatment. But when they reach the stage Hugh is at, it is more a case of providing them with good food, a comfortable bed and a sympathetic ear. And a garden to walk in when the weather improves.’

  ‘And who would look after them, pray?’

  Alicia sipped her coffee. ‘Perhaps some of the girls who are unwilling to take on domestic posts would see things in a different light if they were working to nurse men who have fought for king and country,’ she said, not looking at her stepmother.

  ‘Ah! You mean it as a ploy!’ Blanche smiled thinly. ‘Well I would certainly be very much in favour of anything that brought our domestic staff back up to full strength. I suppose I could endure a few strangers in the guest rooms for a while if that were to be the case.’

  Alicia eyed her stepmother with dislike. ‘I didn’t mean that at all. I was looking at it as our contribution to the war effort and thinking of the good we could do.’

  And of the handsome young men you could have here in your husband’s absence, thought Blanche, but ev
en she did not dare say it.

  ‘And what would your part be in all this?’ she asked instead.

  ‘I am sure if I spent a short while in a Red Cross hospital I would soon learn enough to be able to supervise the nursing staff,’ Alicia said smoothly. ‘Dr Haley would be prepared to act as medical officer for us I know and as I said we would be taking on convalescent cases only.’

  ‘I believe you have taken leave of your senses!’ Blanche declared.

  ‘I think Alicia is right,’ Lawrence said. He had recovered from his coughing fit now. ‘If there is a need for convalescent homes and we can provide one then I think we should do it.’

  ‘And what about those of us who live here?’ Leo enquired raising his nose from his copy of The Times. ‘We are working long hours to build the aeroplanes that are needed. We could do without the inconvenience of sick men in the drawing-room. If you ladies want to do something for the war effort I suggest you confine yourselves to knitting socks or running bazaars to raise money for the plum pudding fund.’

  Alicia glared at him. ‘Don’t patronise, Leo. Well, Father, what do you say? It’s your house – the decision is yours.’

  Gilbert smoothed his moustache with his index finger. For once he had a certain amount of sympathy with Leo – coming home after a hard day at the works to have to be polite, if not sociable, to strangers suffering from various degrees of shell-shock was not the most engaging of prospects. But it was good to see Alicia taking an interest in something again and commendable that she should want to do her bit for the war effort.

  ‘Well, Alicia, it would be up to you to make the arrangements,’ he said. ‘I want no part in it. And we must stipulate that the patients would be at the convalescent stage. I have no desire to be called from my bed to play Florence Nightingale. But if you think you can manage and your heart is set on it then you have my blessing.’