A Safe Harbour, page 13
The woman shot him a genuine smile. Whether or not she believed that Jane needed to consult him, she was willing to go along with the idea that the man was the master. She pulled a curtain aside at the back of the shop and vanished behind it. They could hear her mounting the stairs.
‘I’m sorry,’ William said. ‘Was I rude?’
‘No.’
‘Then tell me why you look so cross.’
‘I’m not cross. Just disappointed. I thought you’d be interested in my plans.’
‘I am. But . . .’
‘But what?’
‘Well, mebbes I had plans too.’
Jane stared at William. She was at a loss how to proceed. William loved her, she was sure of that. She had hinted for long enough that she never wanted to go back to live in the village and he had seemed to accept it. But perhaps he never had. Perhaps she had made it too obvious how very much she loved him and perhaps he had therefore believed that she would give in to him in the end.
If only I could have forgotten about William Lawson the minute I left Cullercoats and came to work in town, she thought. But she had not been able to forget him and her plans for the future had always included him. He didn’t know yet what part he was to play. She hoped he would approve, but first she must show him how happy owning this outfitter’s business would make her.
She looked at him now. So tall, so handsome – so like a Viking, she imagined fancifully – with his strong features and firm jawline and his red-gold hair. But his expression was bleak. She acknowledged he looked uncomfortable in Mr Coulson’s cast-off clothes but, nevertheless, they were better than his own. It had been kind of Mrs Coulson to pass on her husband’s clothing and she had instructed Mrs Roberts, the housekeeper, to allow Mr Lawson to change in the staff cloak cupboard. Jane had expressed her gratitude, but it was a pity she hadn’t had time to alter the suit William was wearing now, for, although he didn’t know it yet, there was another more important meeting ahead of him.
She moved closer to him, gently pressing the length of her body against his. She rested her head on his chest for a moment and then undid a few buttons of his waistcoat. She slipped her hand inside and rested her palm on his smooth, white shirt. She felt his heart begin to race.
‘You do love me, don’t you?’
‘You know I do.’
‘And you want me to be happy?’
‘I do – but I want us to be happy together.’
‘We can be.’
‘I don’t see how. With you setting up in business here in town and me living at the coast.’
‘Be patient. As soon as we’ve done here I’ll explain my plan. But now why don’t you kiss me?’
She raised her head and William claimed her lips eagerly. She could feel his passion rising and her own pulse began to race. In a sudden movement William put his hands to her waist and lifted her up on to the counter.
‘That’s better,’ he said. ‘You’re such a little thing.’
‘No, William. Stop. We mustn’t. But maybe we won’t have to wait much longer.’
She placed her hands on his shoulders and pushed him away. She knew her face was flushed and she turned away from him, swinging her legs up over the counter and down on the other side. For his sake as much as her own she was glad to keep the solid wooden structure between them.
‘Look at all these lovely fabrics,’ she said. ‘Such a variety. There’s taffeta, cotton, poplin, muslin, even organdie. And look – look at these glass-fronted drawers. All the trimmings I need: lace, ribbons, belts, buckles, buttons as well as tapes, threads, pins, hooks and eyes.’
‘Jane, stop! I can see you’re pleased but you might as well be talking a foreign language.’
Jane sighed but continued determinedly, ‘Well, this is in English, plain to see. Can you read this notice?’
William obliged and read the words printed on the card in the fancy frame standing on the counter: ‘ALTERATIONS UNDERTAKEN.’
‘That’s the side of the business I’m going to develop,’ Jane said. ‘That and dressmaking. And, William, I won’t even have to advertise for customers. Mrs Coulson is going to tell all her friends about me. She’ll tell them about the work I’ve done for her and her daughter, and how pleased she is. My reputation should grow by word of mouth, and—William! What are you doing?’
William had pulled a chair forward and was sitting down. He proceeded to take one of his shoes off and knead his foot. ‘These shoes might be long enough but they’re not wide enough,’ he said. ‘If you don’t mind, Jane, I’ll give them to me da when I get home. They should fit him.’
‘I don’t mind at all if you give them to your father.’ She stressed the last word. ‘But now you’d better put your shoe back on before Mrs Hogg comes back.’
Jane felt like crying. William had managed to spoil her happy mood by his sheer lack of interest. No, that wasn’t fair. He loved her and he was pleased for her but he was troubled and she knew why. She walked round the counter to stand beside him. When he had finished tying his shoelace he started to stand but she pushed him back on to the chair gently and sat on his knee.
‘Are you vexed with me?’ he asked. He looked so contrite that she would have forgiven him anything.
‘No. I’m vexed with myself. I brought you here to see what I planned to do and I didn’t explain things properly.’ She paused and took a deep breath. ‘William,’ she began, ‘you want us to be together, don’t you?’
‘You know I do. I want us to be married and I don’t see how we’re going to manage that if I’m in Cullercoats and you are running a business here in Newcastle.’
Jane knew that she had to convince him that their future lay away from Cullercoats. Fishing was a hard life and getting harder. With the competition from Adamson’s steam trawlers and the Scottish boats, the catches were getting smaller and smaller, the men returning after hours of gruelling work with half-empty cobles and grim faces. Some of the fishwives had stopped buying from the beach auction and were going early in the morning to the fish quay at North Shields to buy their herring.
Her mother’s last letter had told her that some of the men didn’t think it was worth going out any more. They had either sold their cobles or left them untended and were seeking work as labourers in the building trade. Jane didn’t want that to happen to William so she’d convinced herself that it wasn’t for entirely selfish reasons that she had thought of another future for him.
‘I know,’ she told him. ‘And I do have a plan. I wanted it to be a surprise after we’d seen the shop. I wanted you to see what a marvellous opportunity this is. I thought you’d be pleased for me’.
William looked uneasy. ‘I am, I suppose.’
Jane dabbed at her eyes with her handkerchief, a tiny square of embroidered linen, but managed to smile through her tears. ‘Oh, William. This is my fault. We should have gone there first.’
‘Gone where?’
‘Wait and see.’
Jane took his large, handsome face between her kid-gloved hands and kissed his brow, his eyes, one after the other, and then his mouth. He responded as he always did and the resulting embrace left her breathless.
‘You smell gorgeous,’ he said when at last they pulled away from each other. ‘Like a summer garden.’
‘And you smell delicious, too. Like a real gentleman.’
The lime-scented brilliantine she had combed through William’s hair before they came had not been salvaged from Mr Coulson’s dressing room. Jane had bought it at Bainbridge’s along with a matching aftershave lotion. William had been genuinely pleased with her gifts and Jane had averted her eyes guiltily, not wishing him to know that her primary concern was that, when they met Mrs Hogg, he would not smell of fish.
‘Er – hum!’
Startled by the sound of a cough, Jane rose hurriedly and so did William. The widow Hogg was smiling.
‘Don’t worry,’ she said. ‘I’m not shocked. Strange as it may seem to you young folk, I can remember what it was like to be engaged to be married. But, now, have you any more questions?’
Jane assured her that she was perfectly satisfied and that she wanted to go ahead. ‘My father will be coming to see you,’ she said. ‘As soon as possible.’
When they left the shop they found that the rain had stopped and the sun was trying to shine. Jane took that as a good omen.
Chapter Eight
‘Well?’
Jane looked up at William uneasily. They had stopped outside another shop. It was closed and the window blinds were pulled right down so that there was only the merest glimpse of a marbled counter to be seen. William hadn’t said a word, and she couldn’t tell from his expression whether he was pleased or affronted. He glanced up at the smart blue façade with the gold-painted name and then, eventually, he turned and looked at her.
‘You want me to work in a shop?’
‘Not just a shop. A fishmonger’s.’
‘A shop assistant?’
‘Not just an assistant. Mr Rennison is expanding the business and he’s looking for a buyer. He no longer wants to depend on taking deliveries from a fish merchant. He needs someone with the right knowledge. Someone who could go to the fish quay in the morning and do the buying for all his shops. Someone who would know how to choose the fish and would know the proper price—’
‘There’s no proper price.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘It depends on the weather – the size of the catch – the demand.’
‘Exactly!’ Jane became a little less anxious. ‘Mr Rennison knows that and he wants someone he can trust.’
‘How do you know this?’
‘He supplies the Coulson household and most of the other big houses in Jesmond, Gosforth and Heaton – the better class of customers.’
‘Better class?’ William raised his brows.
‘You know what I mean.’
‘No, tell me.’
‘William, don’t be difficult. You know very well I mean the richer customers. The ones who are above sending the cook out to the fishwife on the corner.’
For a moment she thought she had angered him but to her relief he smiled.
‘The more fools they,’ he said. ‘The fish they would buy from the creel would be just as good and mebbes even fresher. But don’t worry,’ he said when he saw her frown, ‘I have no objection to rich folk spending their money and keeping poorer folk in business. But you still haven’t explained how you know he’s looking for someone.’
‘Mrs Coulson’s housekeeper is Mr Rennison’s sister. He sometimes visits and I overheard them talking in the kitchen. It’s no secret. I haven’t done anything wrong.’
Jane had decided not to tell William of the months she had spent going round the shops in her brief hours off duty, asking questions and hoping upon hope that such an opportunity might arise. The fact that just a week or two ago everything had seemed to fall into place didn’t mean that she hadn’t been agonizing over William’s future for some time and now she saw this development as no more than she deserved. Surely nothing could go wrong – if only he would agree to the plan.
Although the rain had stopped, a nasty little wind had sprung up and Jane shivered. Usually this would have brought a quick response from William but today he didn’t seem to have noticed. She decided not to be hurt for she saw the speculation in his eyes and hoped that he might be reaching the right conclusions.
‘How do you know he’ll take me on? If I apply for the position, that is. After all, I’m only a fisherman.’
‘Don’t speak like that! You are honest and clever and hardworking. Mr Rennison will recognize those qualities straight away.’
There was something else that Jane thought better to keep to herself: that Mrs Coulson had promised to speak to Mr Rennison and recommend William most highly. And the fact that the fishmonger was a member of the Liberal Club along with Mr Coulson would also help.
‘So you’ll think about it?’ she asked hesitantly.
‘Maybe I will.’ He nodded slowly as he said it but then he frowned.
‘What is it?’
‘There’s my father to think of. I’d have to be sure that he and Thomas could manage without me.’
‘I’ve thought of that.’
‘You have?’ He sounded astonished.
‘My mother told me that Mr Lisle has taken Barty’s death very badly.’
‘Of course he has. Barty was his only son.’
The wind gusted and Jane reached up to hold her hat steady. She felt it lift and the hatpin drag at her hair. ‘I understand that Mr Lisle has sold his coble and is working for anyone who needs an extra man.’
‘That’s true.’
‘Then why shouldn’t your father take him on?’
William looked doubtful. ‘I’m not saying he wouldn’t consider it, but he wouldn’t be pleased with me for leaving him.’
‘Oh, William!’ She wanted to scream at him that he was a grown man and that other men’s sons were leaving Cullercoats to work on the colliers, or even going deep sea. Or labouring in the building trade. Or emigrating to all parts of the Empire.
‘It’s not as if you’d be moving to a different part of the country,’ she said. ‘We could live above the shop – my shop – and, oh, my darling, it’s such a cosy little flat, and you would catch the train early in the mornings down to the Fish Quay, supervise the buying and have the fish packed and sent off to the shops. And you’ll never have to risk life and limb again and break my heart by getting drowned. William, you’ll have a chance to use your brain!’
‘Don’t you think it takes brains to be a fisherman?’
Jane felt her heart thud against her ribs. Had she just spoiled everything? She bit her lip and slanted a worried glance up at him. William was smiling. He was teasing her. She felt like crying with relief.
‘I promise you I’ll think about it, sweetheart,’ he said. ‘It’s true the fishing is dying fast. There’s less fish to go round and I don’t want to find myself scraping a living. Not if I have a wife and family to keep.’
‘Family?’
‘Well, I suppose there’s room for a bairn or two in that cosy little flat above the draper’s shop, isn’t there?’
‘Of course . . . but . . . I mean, I want children, I do really. But not at first, perhaps. I’ll want to get established.’
‘Don’t look so worried, Jane. I know what you want and I don’t mind waiting a year or two for a family. But I hope to God I won’t have to wait much longer before I have a wife.’
‘So will you meet Mr Rennison and talk things over?’
‘Aye, but not today, I hope.’
Jane tried to hide her irritation at his use of ‘aye’. William didn’t speak ‘rough’, but there was no denying that he didn’t speak as well as Kate did. She hoped that when he moved away from the village and started mixing with other tradespeople he would gradually drop some of the words he used now.
‘No, my love. Not today,’ she said. ‘I’ll let you know when Mr Rennison is ready to see you. He’s going to tell . . . he’s going to tell his sister, Mrs Roberts, and she’ll tell me.’
That was another white lie, as Jane preferred to think of it. In fact Mr Rennison had promised to let Mrs Coulson know when he wanted to interview William, but Jane was worried that William might think he was only getting the job because of some sort of patronage. Jane had enough faith in him to believe he would get the job anyway.
‘So what are we going to do now?’ William asked.
‘We’ll go home, shall we?’
‘Home? You mean . . .’
‘Yes, back to Cullercoats. We’ve been keeping folk guessing long enough. Although I must say Kate hasn’t been fooled. William, I want you to come and visit my parents. My mother always cooks too much lunch on a Sunday, especially if she thinks I’m coming home.’
‘Do I have to keep these clothes on?’
‘Well . . .’
‘I wouldn’t be able to do justice to your mother’s cooking if I was worried about popping the buttons on this waistcoat.’
Jane couldn’t help smiling. ‘All right, we’ll go back to Jesmond and you can change. But, perhaps, you should keep that tie on. It’s . . . it’s a little newer than yours.’
William took her arm and began to walk away briskly, obviously relieved and happy to be going back to Cullercoats. And apparently not at all nervous about the meeting with her parents. He had known them all his life. Not only because his sister and Jane were friends but also because everyone in the village knew Jane’s father, the village cobbler. Jane wondered whether he had understood what she’d meant. Did he realize that she wanted folk to accept them officially as a courting couple? She hoped so but, just in case he didn’t, she would prime him on the journey down to the coast on the train.
‘Please don’t walk so fast,’ she begged. ‘I can’t keep up with your long legs.’ He smiled an apology and slowed down. Next time she spoke she was a little breathless. ‘Then after lunch,’ she said, ‘we’ll visit your parents, shall we?’ Her voice faltered. She liked William’s mother very much but the thought of facing Henry Lawson was frightening. Especially if he’d had a drink or two. ‘Perhaps we won’t stay too long there.’ She paused to gauge his reaction. He was still smiling. She hurried on, ‘Because I think we should spend the rest of the day with Kate. She must be lonely living in that cottage by herself and it’s time I visited her.’
‘Anything you say, sweetheart.’
William grinned and Jane realized that he had understood what she’d meant, after all. Perhaps he didn’t altogether approve of her plans for their future, but she thought that the fact that she was prepared to go with him and tell their families that they were going to be married had lifted his spirits.
William was still smiling. He was happier than he’d been for a long time.
‘Jane, I’m very happy for you.’
William had been summoned to the boat field by Thomas, who said that a few of the lads wanted to ask his advice about something, so Kate and her friend had taken their chairs into the back yard of Belle Vue cottage in order to catch the evening sun while they gossiped.
