Page 26 of The Affairs of Ashmore Castle

Trump made a short whine.

‘All right for you,’ she said. ‘You wouldn’t be the one to get into trouble. Shall we go and look outside?’

There was a pleasant terrace of broad flags outside the French windows, with a balustrade punctuated by large urns dividing it from a lawn. Formal flowerbeds were cut into it, in which Nina saw the pointed green noses of bulbs beginning to come through. At the end of the lawn was a pergola stretching right across, occupied by tightly clipped roses, dividing it from the rest of the pleasure grounds. Evidently Deering wasn’t able, alone, to keep up all the grounds, for beyond the pergola everything was overgrown and neglected, specimen trees and shrubs with winding paths among them leading down to the small lake and the stone temple. This was placed, Nina realised, so that the sun would slant into it and warm the person sitting on the stone bench inside. A perfect place for solitude and thought. The lake was overgrown and silted up, but she imagined it cleared and planted, with water-lilies, clumps of iris and bulrushes, and bright ducks paddling about.

Trump, burrowing about at the lake’s edge, had dislodged a frog, whose enormous leap made him scuttle backwards in fright. Nina laughed, then pressed her hands tightly against her breastbone to stop her excitement rising. We won’t be living here, she told herself, he doesn’t like it. But the damage had already been done. The thought of Beechcroft was more prison-like than ever.

On Saturday afternoon Mr Cowling took her for a walk around the little town, which was charmingly compact, centred on the marketplace. All the people they passed smiled and greeted them pleasantly, as if they were happy to be living there.

He had something in particular to show her. Just around the corner from the church, and coming as a surprise in that location, was a massive factory, the front stretching right along the street. It was four storeys high, built in the same handsome red brick as Wriothesby House, with a multitude of big windows as if it were a great mansion rather than a workshop.

‘It’s right in the centre of the town!’ Nina marvelled.

‘Why not?’ Mr Cowling said. ‘Work is the heart of a place, just as much as church. A man with no work’s got nothing in his belly and no stomach for sermons.’ He looked up at the façade with interest and pleasure. ‘Aye, there can’t be many folk in the town that haven’t depended on this place for their bread and butter, one way or another.’

‘This is the one you’re thinking of buying?’ Nina asked.

‘That’s right. Crawford’s stockings. It’d go well with Cowling’s boots and shoes, don’t you think?’

And you could walk here from Wriothesby House, Nina thought longingly.

Easter Sunday was a bright, breezy day of sudden sunshine and racing shadows, with a taste of fresh dampness on the air. There was a bowl of primroses on the breakfast table. Nina thanked Mrs Deering with a heartfelt look as she brought in the coffee. And when she came downstairs dressed for church, the housekeeper brought her a little bound bunch of violets to pin to her coat, their purple faces still damp, and smelling of spring. Nina was so touched she had no words, but Mrs Deering looked content, as though she had read her mind.

Trump came bouncing up, ready for a walk. ‘No, you can’t come,’ Nina said. Trump, reading her tone of voice, lowered his tail and his ears. ‘Oh dear, poor dog, you do hate being left behind,’ she said.

‘I’ll look after him, madam,’ said Mrs Deering. ‘Come along, you come with me to the kitchen. I’ve a bit of old rug I can put down for him by the stove,’ she added to Nina.

Nina remembered Mrs Mitchell, and was almost tearful with thanks.

They walked to church. It was handsome, in the perpendicular style, full of light, simple and elegant – quintessentially English. She liked it as much as she liked Wriothesby House, and felt a twinge of guilt, suspecting Mr Cowling would prefer something flamboyantly Gothic. Oh dear. She hadn’t known she had any taste, and now she was discovering that what she liked was the opposite of what her husband admired.

As they entered, many heads turned, and Nina knew herself subjected to inspection. Mr Cowling seemed to like it, and pulled himself up taller, pressing her captive hand against his ribs and strutting a little, proud of her. A sidesman scurried up to them and whispered, ‘Allow me to show you the Wriothesby House pew, madam, sir,’ which proved he, at least, knew who they were. In a small place, news gets about quickly. Nina would have liked to look about her but, as the stared-at person, had to keep her eyes forward and pretend serene indifference.

At the end of the service there was the usual press of people around the door waiting to talk to the vicar. Nina was resigned to joining the queue, but Mr Cowling spotted someone outside and drew her along with him, bypassing the pastoral blockage.

‘Crawford!’ he called. ‘Over here, sir!’

It was a thin man with an anxious expression in slightly dusty-looking Sunday blacks. The woman on his arm was thin and mousy in a wide hat that looked too big for her, as if it were bent on squashing her into the ground. They turned and waited for Mr Cowling, who, though no taller than Crawford, seemed in his breezy confidence to tower over him.

‘Nina, my dear, may I present Mr Arnold Crawford and Mrs Crawford – my wife. I’m glad to see you, Crawford. You hinted you had a plan to tell me about. Not changing your mind about selling?’

Mr Crawford removed his hat and bowed to Nina; Mrs Crawford gave her a nervous smile, and clung harder than ever to her husband’s arm. ‘Now, Mr Cowling, you know it was never an outright sale we mentioned,’ Crawford said. ‘My grandfather built that factory, and it’s been at the heart of Market Harborough for three generations. It’s my sadness that I haven’t a son to leave it to. But to sell it outright would be like parting with one of the family.’

‘Then, what’s this plan of yours?’ Mr Cowling asked impatiently.

‘By your leave, sir, not here, not now.’ For all his mild appearance, he could speak firmly when he wanted to. ‘I’d like to put it to you when we both have time to consider it carefully. I have figures and drawings to show you. From what I know about you, I think it is something you will find interesting.’

‘Ah, looked me up in my glory, have you?’ Even Mr Cowling’s jokes sounded too robust for this sad man. She imagined Mr Crawford giving away a beloved old dog because he couldn’t afford to keep it – hoping it was going to a good home, but unable, of course, to be absolutely sure.

She spoke before she had realised she was going to. ‘Would you and Mrs Crawford do us the honour of dining with us tomorrow? Then you and Mr Cowling can talk business after dinner, while Mrs Crawford and I have a comfortable coze by the fire.’

None of the other three looked at her with the surprise she felt in herself. But Mr Cowling said, ‘Capital idea, my love! Yes, do come and dine, if you’ve no other engagement. There’s no party, I’m afraid – it will be just us. But we’d be delighted.’

The Crawfords exchanged a glance, and Mr Crawford smiled and said, ‘That’s very civil of you, Mrs Cowling. We’d be delighted.’

‘We’ll dine early, if that suits you,’ Cowling said. ‘Then we’ll have time to discuss this mysterious plan of yours. Six o’clock?’

Kindnesses were murmured, hats were touched, and Mr Cowling led Nina away. She felt anxious, and was assembling excuses for her strange outburst, when he said, ‘A good notion of yours, my love, to get him onto my ground where I’ll have the upper hand. I can see you’ll be an asset to my business.’ This was only partly a joke. ‘As long as you won’t be too bored. Mrs C doesn’t look like sparky company. Pity we can’t get young Decius over to entertain you while I dissect friend Crawford. You’ll speak to Mrs Deering about putting on a slap-up dinner? From the look of them, they don’t get many.’