A Fallen Woman

‘All the same…it could cause more trouble between you and him.’

‘I don’t see why. Folk can choose where they want to work so long as there’s work enough. Anyway, Benjamin Sampson wouldn’t think twice about sacking them if things got that bad. So why should they be loyal to him? Their only loyalty is to themselves and their families. Besides, I’ll be paying them more money.’

‘As long as it don’t make things awkward between me and Aurelia.’

‘Why should it?’

‘I think the world of her. She is my sister.’

‘Half-sister,’ he corrected with a smile. ‘And I know you think the world of her. But this is business, Marigold. Nothing to do with Aurelia. So why should it make things awkward between you two?’

‘P’raps it won’t. But she has enough to contend with, what with Benjamin and all. The things she tells me…’ Marigold rolled her eyes.

‘Oh? What sort of things?’ He wondered what poor, lovely Aurelia might have to contend with that he wasn’t already aware of.

‘Well, they don’t sleep together no more, for one thing. Not since before Christina was born.’

‘Fancy…’ He pondered Aurelia and her troubled marriage for a moment. Such a waste of a worthy woman; Benjamin Sampson was an utter fool. ‘Let’s go and see how your mate the hedgehog is getting on,’ he said in an effort to divert himself and Marigold from the subject of Aurelia and her troubled marriage. He stood up and together they ambled in silence to the spot where they had encountered the prickly creature.

‘Oh, Algie!’ she exclaimed, with obvious delight. ‘I swear some of that bread has gone. I wonder if he had a drink of milk as well.’ She stooped down to inspect the area for clues. ‘I bet he has, Algie.’ She stood up again. ‘I’m going to put more bread and milk out for him tomorrow night. D’you think I should?’

‘He might fancy a change,’ Algie replied, tongue-in-cheek. ‘Try him with a pork chop with some gravy and cabbage.’

‘Oh, hark at you! Why can’t you be serious? D’you think hedgehogs like cheese?’

‘Ask him. A lump of my favourite cheddar would cheer him up no end, I bet.’

* * *

Chapter 5 (#u2d0cfbca-c6b2-5d2d-876a-e33d29f7eaba)

And so the big day at last arrived for the wedding of Harriet Meese to Clarence Froggatt. St Michael’s red-brick hulk in Brierley Hill was bedecked inside with gold chrysanthemums. Supervised by Priss the day before, the blooms were positioned to best advantage in various locations within the church with the help of Harriet’s other sisters. This exercise was not just to make it look pretty, but to elicit favourable comments also, for Priss was generally starved of any praise and strove to invoke it in whatever way possible.

Outside, the sun was shining, as if to extol its symbolic blessing on the happy, well-matched couple. There were about eighty guests, plus a throng of the uninvited curious who came mainly to inspect the bride and her dress, for she was well known in the town for her exquisite couture. Others attended merely to wish the couple well.

Eli Meese, almost as portly as his wife in his tailed coat and striped trousers, symbolically handed over his second daughter at the behest of the curate, Mr Cuthbert Delacroix, who, of the two parish clergy, had been the one favoured with the task of conducting the ceremony. This was a sop to Priss, because of her partiality to him.

Clarence turned to his bride with a proud smile. When prompted, he took her hand and repeated after the curate, ‘I, Clarence George, take thee Harriet Delicia, to be my wedded wife, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death us do part, according to God’s holy ordinance; and thereto I plight thee my troth.’

Looking into his eyes through her veil, Harriet took his hand in turn, as directed by Mr Delacroix, and dutifully repeated her vows. Her voice and diction were as clear as the locally made crystal glass, and the entire congregation could hear her with perfect clarity.

Cuthbert Delacroix smiled his encouragement.

‘Oh, eternal God, Creator and Preserver of all mankind, Giver of all spiritual grace, the Author of everlasting life; send thy blessing upon these thy servants, this man and this woman, whom we bless in thy Name…’

While the two figures were kneeling at the altar listening to Cuthbert Delacroix forging this legal and spiritual bond, a clatter from among the guests on the bride’s side ensured that disdainful heads at once turned to see who the clumsy culprit might be. Algie Stokes had accidentally knocked his Book of Common Prayer onto the floor and the racket, though minor, echoed magnified throughout the nave. He stooped to pick it up and looked apologetically at Marigold.

‘Clumsy article,’ she whispered, smiling good-naturedly, her eyes brimming with forgiveness, while the curate progressed with the ceremony unperturbed.

Algie glanced around him with mild embarrassment to ascertain whom he had troubled with this trifling disturbance. He caught sight of Benjamin Sampson and Aurelia behind him, a few pews distant. Benjamin was looking straight ahead, an expression of bored indifference on his face, while Aurelia flashed a smile from under her fashionable toque. A lump came to Algie’s throat.

It seemed no time before the congregation was outside, fanning out in the elevated churchyard which overlooked Stourbridge and Audnam. This animated group of well-dressed guests nodded their smiling faces to one another in the late summer sunshine. Wisps of white cloud drifted unhurriedly overhead and a light breeze stirred the trees. The appointed photographer adjusted his huge wooden plate camera on its tripod and tried to muster the wedding group into a formal pose on the church steps. He ducked under a black shroud, his arm outstretched so he could operate the shutter on the lens and, in a muffled cry, called ‘Watch the birdie!’

The six bridesmaids were Harriet’s sisters, all as yet slender, unlike their mother who was endowed with the girth of a small gasometer. They wore gold dresses that perfectly matched the chrysanthemums adorning the inside of the church. Their girlish chatter was interspersed with giggles as they shuffled about self-consciously to find a place that would be to their individual advantage when the photographs eventually appeared for posterity. When the best man, a good-looking fellow, was asked to join the group, those bridesmaids in their later teen years vied vigorously for position next to him.

The breeze pressed Harriet’s white wedding dress in billows about her figure, and she resembled some Pre-Raphaelite heroine. She was clearly happy and excited, smiling contentedly, counting her blessings that she had been able to captivate this handsome young man at her side whose hand she was holding. She was well aware of the shortcomings in her looks, and that Clarence could have had his pick of much prettier girls in this town and beyond. But he had chosen her and she was beside herself with joy, for she could still hardly believe it. She felt like a queen. Destiny had been kind; her life was settled, her future mapped out. Graciously, she accepted the good wishes of everybody who called their congratulations. Later, at the wedding reception in the assembly rooms at the Bell Hotel across the street, she would have the opportunity to thank them all.

‘Harriet looks lovely, Algie,’ Marigold whispered as she held his hand and watched the proceedings. ‘Don’t you think so?’

Algie agreed.

‘Just think, it could have been you standing at her side if you’d decided to marry her.’ She was mindful that early on in their courtship she had deemed Harriet a dangerous rival.

He laughed. ‘Don’t be daft. I would never have married Harriet. She would never have had me anyway.’

‘Well, you never asked her.’

‘Course I didn’t ask her, you nit.’ He smiled affectionately. ‘Once I’d met you, she never had a chance.’

‘I reckon she’d have made you a good wife all the same. She’ll make Clarence a good wife.’

‘I expect she will. She’s got the makings.’

‘I bet Clarence is glad he never married your Kate, the way she turned out.’

Algie rolled his eyes. ‘It was on the cards, but the Lord help him if he had.’

Marigold, in her new outfit, looked as exquisite as a young princess. Algie had anticipated that at this event some handsome women would be flaunting themselves, bedecked in a dazzling array of finery, and he dearly wished for Marigold not to be outdazzled. Her pastel blue dress was a perfect fit, accentuating her small waist and her shapely young bosom. The girlish set of her head was enhanced by an elegant toque that sat stylishly on the mound of lush dark hair piled-up as if nonchalantly, with a deliberately wayward wisp caressing her slender neck.

As the photographer coaxed the newlyweds’ immediate families into another formal pose, Algie was conscious of somebody close behind them. He turned to look.

‘Hello, you two.’

‘Aurelia!’

His heartbeat quickened. It was always the same where she was concerned. Warily, self-consciously, he glanced at Benjamin, wondering if he had noticed his floundering reaction to her. Benjamin’s eyes were scrutinising Marigold, however, as he casually pulled out a silver cigarette case from an inside pocket of his jacket and lit up.

It is a strange but undeniably true saying that the grass on the other side of the fence always seems greener than the grass on one’s own side. So the wife of Algie Stokes seemed eminently more appealing to Benjamin than his own. Conversely, from Algie’s viewpoint, Aurelia had always seemed the most beautiful, the most exotic creature on God’s earth. Always, he was moved at sight of her. He was also acutely aware that Benjamin did not love his own beautiful young wife, and he could not understand the man’s idiocy, for she was divine. To a detached onlooker, however, there was little to choose between Aurelia and Marigold. They looked like sisters, visibly akin.

‘I love Harriet’s wedding dress,’ Aurelia admitted generously.

‘I just said as much to Algie,’ Marigold said, adding proudly, ‘and she uses the same dressmaker as us.’

Marigold glanced at Algie for his nod of approval, but his eyes were transfixed on Aurelia’s captivating face.

‘Your dress too, Marigold – it’s beautiful. Didn’t I tell you it would be some spectacle?’

Marigold smiled and touched Aurelia’s arm with sisterly affection. ‘Thank you. But so does yours.’ Marigold turned to Aurelia’s husband. ‘Don’t you think your wife looks lovely, Benjamin?’ she asked mischievously, keen to eke out of him a positive answer on Aurelia’s behalf.