Daughter of the House

Poor Higgs folded a piece of sacking to protect his trousers and knelt to peer underneath the Daimler. The buses and lorries had not moved which meant the police must have closed the road.

‘Would you like to come and have a drink?’

No, Nancy prepared to say, but another unexpected instinct shouted Yes, oh yes.

‘There’s a place just down that alley,’ she pointed.

‘Very good.’ Mr Maitland cheerfully told Higgs that they would be waiting inside, out of the rain, and swept Nancy towards an inviting doorway.

The pub was well known to Nancy and she didn’t think about the row of workmen at the bar, or the cindery fire, or the reek of spilled beer rising from the bare floorboards. But the man took all this in before pulling out a chair for her at the table closest to the hearth. Only when he had made her comfortable did he remove his own coat and white silk scarf. He was wearing immaculate evening dress, quite different from the kind Devil wore on stage. He spoke two words to the usually surly publican who came running with kindling to restore the fire. He called Mr Maitland ‘sir’ without a flicker of insolence.

Nancy asked for a half of bitter, and two polished glasses were set in front of them without any spillage on the table. This man was used to being served.

‘Do you usually drink beer?’ he asked her.

‘Yes.’ It was hardly worth pointing out that she liked whisky but couldn’t afford it, or gin, or even sherry.

Although he didn’t smile readily, he had an unusual dimple high on his left cheek that seemed to deepen when he was amused. Nancy took off her sorry hat and her hair came down with it. He looked more closely at her.

‘My name is Gil Maitland.’

‘How do you do? I am Nancy Wix.’

‘I am pleased to meet you, Miss Wix.’

She could almost believe this, because he seemed suddenly to be in a much better humour. A slow tide of blood rose from her throat to her cheeks. The warmth of the bar made her nose run and her chilblains itched almost unbearably. She had to sniff, and clench her fists to stop herself clawing at her knuckles. Gil Maitland took out a folded handkerchief and handed it over. It was thick and starched and almost certainly monogrammed.

When she tried to hand it back he said, ‘Please, keep it.’

There would be plenty more handkerchiefs where this one had come from, she thought, laid in a tallboy by a laundry maid overseen by the valet. From this single detail she found she could imagine all the ease of Gil Maitland’s life. With Jinny Main and their other friends she would have dismissed him as the enemy, but now she felt oddly benign towards him. He was only a man, another human being, and his high assurance didn’t repel her in the least.

The exact opposite, in fact.

She wanted to laugh, from amusement and happiness, and he saw it and now he did smile. Gil Maitland would not miss much, she realised.

‘Well, Miss Wix. Who are you and what do you do?’

Because he asked questions that were sufficiently interested without being over-inquisitive, and because he listened to her answers, she confided far more about Lennox & Ringland and her family and the Palmyra than she would ordinarily have done. Mr Maitland smoked two cigarettes, gold-tipped with black papers, and drank his beer.

‘Now it’s your turn. Who are you?’ she asked at the end.

‘I’m afraid I have nothing so exotic to tell.’

Nancy had never thought of her background as anything of the kind, and the notion was surprising.

All in all Gil Maitland was a surprising person.

‘I am just a businessman,’ he added.

‘No, that’s not fair. You let me babble on for ages so you should tell me your story in return.’

Was she being rude? Nancy wasn’t sure. She just wanted to go on sitting here, looking at him and talking.

There was the cleft in the cheek again. ‘I am afraid of boring you. What would you like to know? My grandfather made his fortune importing Indian cotton and setting up Manchester factories. My father was a chemical engineer, and he developed and patented the Maitland Process.’ He cocked an eyebrow at her. ‘Can you really be interested in all this? The Maitland Process is a method by which large quantities of fabric can be cheaply and permanently dyed and printed.’

‘I see.’ She could imagine, at any rate.

‘I am an economist. I have broadened the scope of our businesses and I am investing in new methods of manufacture. Maitland’s creates employment and generates wealth, you know. Perhaps you disapprove of capitalism?’

‘Of course I do.’

After a moment Gil Maitland laughed, and so did she.

‘I’d have been disappointed to hear otherwise,’ he said.

She would have liked to begin a debate, as she had done several times in this very pub, with such a plum representative of the other faction. She was disappointed when she saw the chauffeur discreetly approaching.

‘Excuse me, Mr Maitland. Just to let you know the car’s running again, and the road is open.’

Did she imagine it, or was Gil Maitland also disappointed?

‘Thank you, Higgs.’

Mr Maitland helped her into her coat and she did her best to fix her hat. His eyes were steady as she twitched the hopeless brim.

‘I hope you will let me give you a lift?’

Nancy buttoned her gloves. She was trying to work out how old he was. Perhaps in his mid- to late-thirties, she decided.

‘Well … thank you. I’d rather like a ride home in a Daimler. I’ll be able to tell my father all about it.’

The big car glided up Faringdon Road. Perched in the leather interior Nancy wondered what it would be like to be married to a man like Gil Maitland. He hadn’t mentioned a wife, and she had deliberately not asked him.

It would be rather wonderful, she thought.

For the first time, Eliza’s perennial advice to look for a rich husband made sense. Fortunately the darkness hid her blazing cheeks.

Don’t be so bloody ridiculous, she told herself. That’s not what you want at all.

The car drew up much too soon beside the canal and Higgs opened the passenger door for her.

‘Thank you. That was very interesting,’ she told Mr Maitland as she stepped out.

‘It was interesting for me too. Goodnight, Nancy.’

The car slid away. It was still raining.

Goodnight, Gil, she whispered to herself.