Charity Read online

  ‘Don’t let him take the little ones away,’ she begged her grandmother. ‘Mr and Mrs Charles are kind, and all three of them are so happy and settled there. I can get a job and when I’m big enough I’ll look after them.’

  ‘Charity, my dear –’ Isobel Pennycuick was torn now between loyalty to her son and a surge of unexpected tenderness for her motherless grandchildren – ‘you are only fifteen. If you were twenty-one things might be different.’

  She wished she could explain how confused she had felt when she heard of her daughter’s death. Grief and guilt had been tormenting her ever since she’d received the news of the fire.

  ‘Is he thinking of bringing them here?’ Charity was aghast.

  ‘Now don’t be silly.’ Grandmother laughed lightly. ‘You’ve seen how things are. We couldn’t possibly look after small children. No, he’s more keen to find homes where each one of them would get a chance in life.’

  ‘Split them up?’ The room seemed to spin. Charity could hardly believe she was hearing this.

  ‘My dear.’ Her grandmother put one cool hand on Charity’s chin and lifted her face up to hers. ‘I can’t promise anything just now. Ideally we’d like them to stay together. But it’s like finding good homes for puppies. How many people could care for three boisterous dogs and train them all?’

  ‘But they aren’t puppies, they’re children who love one another. We’re a family, Grandmother, and we must stay together. Can’t you make him see that?’

  ‘I doubt I could ever make him see anything my way,’ she said tartly. ‘My husband brought Stephen up to believe women were put on this earth to serve, not to have opinions. He feels it is his duty to give all four of you the advantages he had as a boy.’

  Charity lay in the high narrow bed too upset to sleep. It was quiet in Clapham, but here the absolute silence was eerie. Back there a small light was always left on out on the landing, she could hear Prue’s breathing and the comforting sound of passing cars. It was so dark here she felt crushed by it. She needed to go to the lavatory but she was too scared to get out of the safety of her bed.

  Moving away from Greenwich and learning from books had made her far more aware of a bigger world and all the opportunities out there waiting for them all. But she still couldn’t understand why Uncle Stephen thought more disruption in the children’s lives would benefit them.

  Uncle Geoff would see all three of them got a good education. Auntie Lou would see they had good manners and bring them up to be truthful and honest. What was it that Uncle Stephen was suggesting about these nice people anyway?

  Anxiety deepened as the days went slowly past. Exploring the house and grounds, both alone and with her grandmother, brought some measure of excitement to alleviate the feeling of oppression, but Charity felt as if she was under close scrutiny, being tested for something.

  Studley Priory was a house so steeped in history, so far removed from anything in her experience that she couldn’t fail to be enthralled. Aside from the lawns being cut, the grounds had been sadly neglected. Bushes grew out through the stable roof, a walled garden was choked with weeds, yet there were signs everywhere of how gracious it had once been. Rotting saddles still hung in the stables and there was a whiff of gleaming hunters and a ghostly ring of hooves on the mud-covered cobbled floor.

  Winding corridors, dusty rooms packed with treasures from all corners of the globe … On her first morning she saw the old library beyond the drawing room that Uncle Stephen had as his room and marvelled at the wall-to-wall old leatherbound books, his collection of guns, knives and a huge mock battleground where he manoeuvred a vast collection of lead soldiers to re-enact famous battle scenes. Beyond this room there was the shut-up north wing. She saw the octagonal chapel, still with a small altar and pews and looked at the immense family bible. Here she traced her ancestors, some of whom had as many as eight children, until the last entry, which was her mother’s birth and subsequent christening back in 1921.

  A picture formed in her head when she saw how far the nursery suite was from her grandparents’ rooms in the main wing, of a child shut away with nursemaids and governesses, perhaps only presented to her mother and father for a few minutes a day. Was this why Charity had been relegated to nursemaid almost as soon as her brothers and sister were born?

  Charity learned from her grandmother that the only staff now left were Ellen who cooked their meals, Jackson who should by rights be retired, one gardener and a couple of women who came in from the village to clean. There was also a nurse who came in from time to time to bath Stephen. No scurrying maids in those attic rooms, no grooms or butler; not even a live-in housekeeper.

  But though Charity was happy to clean silver, to sweep down the cobwebs in the shut-up rooms and help Jackson with some weeding, she couldn’t like her uncle.

  Grandmother was changeable. Sometimes she was warm, sometimes frosty, but Charity felt that with time they might become closer. But Uncle Stephen treated her with scorn, belittling every attempt she made to please him. He rapped her knuckles for picking up the wrong cutlery, sneered at her few questions and his piggy eyes followed her every movement with suspicion.

  Charity was aware he couldn’t do much for himself. Getting him in and out of bed or to and from his chair involved a great deal of huffing and puffing and shouting at both Jackson and her grandmother. But she’d seen him wheel himself into the bathroom adjoining his room, so she assumed he used the toilet too. When Grandmother told her the district nurse couldn’t make it that day and Uncle Stephen had to have an enema, it meant nothing to Charity. She assumed this meant some kind of injection, or even medicine.

  ‘I know this is going to be difficult for you,’ Grandmother said as she took a length of rubber tubing from a cabinet in his bathroom. ‘But I need another pair of hands.’

  She mixed up a soap solution and poured it into an enamel can, then attached the rubber tube to a nozzle.

  Even then Charity didn’t catch on, and Grandmother didn’t attempt to explain.

  Stephen was lying in bed like a great whale, wearing what seemed to be an old-fashioned nightshirt. The bed was similar to hospital beds that could be raised or lowered with a crank. It had canvas straps dangling at the sides which she’d heard were for strapping him in at night in case he fell out.

  ‘We have to get him on to his side.’ Grandmother approached Stephen, who gripped his mattress. ‘Now when I get to three, roll him.’

  Charity took her place by her uncle’s shoulder and at the count of three heaved and pushed until she was presented with his broad back.

  ‘Now just slide this under him.’ Grandmother had a stiff rubber mat thing and as she pushed it against him, Uncle Stephen managed to lift himself a little with his elbow.

  The horror started as Grandmother pulled back his nightshirt to reveal his bottom and what was left of his legs.

  His bottom was huge, white and flabby, covered in wiry hair. In contrast, his thighs were wasted away, little thicker than Charity’s own and the stumps were an angry red, hideously puckered, resembling crudely made sausages.

  Grandmother sat on the bed beside him and moved his thighs up into a crouching position. Charity got a glimpse of a red anus and hairy testicles. Suddenly she understood where the tube was going.

  ‘Hurry up, woman,’ he grunted churlishly, thankfully unable to see the disgust on Charity’s face. ‘It’s bad enough without you taking all day about it.’

  ‘Hold the can,’ Grandmother said sharply, indicating that Charity should pick it up from the small trolley. ‘Come closer, it won’t stretch that far. When I tell you, turn on that little tap.’

  Charity had to stare, even though she wanted to vomit, as Grandmother pushed the hard nozzle on the end of the tube into her son. ‘Turn the tap on now,’ she ordered.

  Uncle Stephen was making the most horrible noises, a cross between grunting and heavy breathing, and the mountain of flesh in front of her was quivering.

  It seemed like hour
s that she stood there holding the can aloft. She wanted to cry, she was so embarrassed and disgusted.

  ‘Look inside the can. Tell me when the water’s gone right down.’ Grandmother’s slender fingers held the nozzle in his anus.

  ‘There’s about an inch left,’ Charity told her in a shaking voice.

  ‘Turn the tap off, then.’

  She did as she was told, averting her eyes as the tube was pulled out of his bottom and excess liquid dabbed up with a towel. Alone, Grandmother pulled her son on to his back again, quickly covering his nakedness.

  ‘Right, dear.’ She patted Stephen’s fat stomach. ‘Up now!’

  Charity thought for a moment her task was finished. Her uncle gripped the mattress either side of him and with his mother pushing at him, he hoisted himself to a sitting position. But to her horror it didn’t end there. Stephen was pushing hard on his hands either side of the bed, looking expectantly at her.

  ‘The bedpan,’ Grandmother barked, nodding towards the china receptacle on the bottom of a trolley beside the bed. ‘As I help lift him, you slide it under him.’

  Charity did as she was told, too shocked to refuse, and as Grandmother put her arms round her son’s middle and strained to lift him, she slid it across the bed. A glimpse of her uncle’s flaccid penis hanging beneath him made Charity gasp.

  ‘Not that way,’ Grandmother snapped. ‘Can’t you see the way it’s pointed at one end? That goes to the front.’

  ‘Hurry up, for God’s sake, if you don’t want shit all over the place,’ her uncle bellowed.

  Charity pushed it under him, closing her eyes in nausea. But the nightmare was by no means over. As they moved back, the most hideous, farting, squelching noise came from him, bringing with it an evil smell.

  ‘We’ll leave him now till he’s finished,’ Grandmother said quite calmly as if they were discussing a child on his pot, not a grown man spewing out two pints of noxious fluid into a bedpan and grunting with obvious satisfaction. ‘Ring when you want me,’ she added to her son.

  Charity couldn’t get out fast enough. She rushed to the open back door by the still room and took great gasps of clean air.

  ‘Not very nice, is it?’ Grandmother said grimly behind her. ‘Sometimes I think it would’ve been better if he’d died of his injuries.’

  Charity looked round and saw bitterness on the old lady’s face.

  ‘I used to give him opening medicine,’ she continued, her mouth a thin line of disgust. ‘But he messed his bed and trousers so often that I resorted to this. Well, what else can I do?’

  Charity said nothing. She wouldn’t want to clear that sort of mess either, especially for someone who showed no affection or even appreciation of all his mother did for him, but just the same she couldn’t help feeling there had to be a less disgusting way of dealing with a necessary bodily function.

  Charity picked up the duster she’d left when Grandmother had asked her to help and continued polishing the Chinese drinks cabinet. Grandmother sat on the settee, staring into space.

  ‘What was he like before he was wounded?’ Charity wanted something attractive or romantic in her mind rather than that vision of his huge flabby belly hanging over his stumps.

  ‘Very handsome.’ Grandmother turned her head towards Charity, half smiling as if glad of a diversion. ‘Everything you’d expect of an officer – dashing, athletic, with lovely blond hair like yours. He was always a little pompous, mark you. Of course as his mother I didn’t notice that so much then. Would you like to see a photograph?’

  A disgusting smell wafted out from the direction of Stephen’s room. Grandmother wrinkled her small nose distastefully, closed the door tightly and moved over to open one of the windows.

  ‘I keep these tucked away,’ she said, taking a leatherbound album out of a drawer in the desk. ‘After he was wounded and Barbara left him, he couldn’t bear to see them.’

  ‘Barbara?’ Charity asked.

  ‘His wife,’ Grandmother frowned. ‘She skipped off the moment she knew he wasn’t going to die. Always was a flibbertigibbet – no sense of duty. But there, wasn’t he handsome?’

  There was no resemblance to the monster in the study. This man was slender with the perfect features she associated with swashbuckling heroes of the screen. His hair was indeed as blond as her own and parted on one side. His eyes looked huge and a thin moustache gave him a dashing air. He was in full dress uniform, a silver chain with a whistle attached across his chest, shiny peaked cap tucked under one arm, a sword at his side.

  ‘The jacket was green with black buttons.’ Grandmother touched the faded photograph with obvious nostalgia. ‘I try to remember him like this, but it isn’t easy now.’

  It was the first time Charity had felt a need to touch her grandmother. She wanted to comfort her, yet felt that any physical contact would be rebuffed.

  The bell rang loudly before she could study the picture further, or even comment. Grandmother hastily shoved the album back in the drawer, and patted Charity’s shoulder in a gesture that indicated her understanding of how the girl felt.

  ‘Don’t worry. I’ll get them out again,’ she whispered. ‘But now we have to finish off in there.’

  It was even worse. Charity had to draw out the bedpan from beneath him and he was partially stuck to it. The smell was overpowering and she had to hold her breath and look away.

  ‘Go and empty it, girl,’ Uncle Stephen bellowed at her. ‘I don’t want you peering up my arse while she wipes it.’

  It was almost full to the brim, and slopped as she walked. This time she couldn’t hold back the nausea and as she emptied the pan into the lavatory she brought up her breakfast too.

  ‘No Scrabble tonight, Charity, it’s time we discussed the future.’ Uncle Stephen moved his wheelchair till he was facing her. His face seemed even more bloated tonight, a sly look in his small, sharp eyes. ‘We thought the beginning of September would be a good time for you to come back permanently.’

  As his words growled out, Charity felt as if someone had pulled a trapdoor open under her feet and she was falling into a pit.

  She looked to her grandmother, hoping for some support, but Grandmother bent her head, afraid to meet her eyes.

  ‘Permanently!’ Charity looked at him in horror.

  Stephen Pennycuick had no interest in female children and Charity had turned out to be much as he’d expected, frail, skinny and timid. She did, however, have two unexpected attributes: his mother liked her and the girl wasn’t afraid of hard work.

  ‘Yes of course permanently.’ He waved his hands in a gesture that said she had no choice in the matter. ‘Your grandmother needs help, and there’s nothing else for you.’

  In that instant Charity knew this was what he’d always intended, this week hadn’t been a holiday but a trial period and she had played right into his hands.

  ‘I want to work with children,’ she said in a small voice. ‘It’s kind of you to offer me a home, Uncle Stephen, but I’d be lonely here.’

  ‘Bosh.’ Stephen’s fat face grew an even darker shade of purple. ‘You’ll have too much to do to feel lonely. Besides the village is only down the road, you can visit Oxford.’

  Charity had already discovered that the village of Studley-cum-Norton had nothing more than a post office. Even the bus into Oxford only ran once a day.

  ‘But the children?’ She blurted out. ‘It’s so far away from them!’

  ‘They’ll be away at boarding-schools soon,’ he snapped. ‘They don’t need a nursemaid at their age.’

  Charity sensed she was edging towards a trap, the kind with steep sides she’d never get out of. She needed advice from Lou and Charles before she said another word.

  ‘You won’t mind if I think it over first?’ she said more boldly than she felt. ‘I didn’t expect this.’

  Stephen Pennycuick had never considered that females had minds of their own. They were there to be decorative, useful and to provide comfort for men. Two or three
times in the week he’d been brought up sharply when he discovered this girl was actually quite bright.

  ‘I suggest you think of your brothers and sister.’ His tone was oily, his words carefully chosen to frighten her. ‘As their guardian I have the right to provide for them as I see fit. Any awkwardness from you and I might very well feel less amenable to them.’

  The threat hung in the air. Charity looked across the room to her grandmother for support, but she was studying a book as if she couldn’t hear or see anything. She was old and growing frail and although she wasn’t cruel like her son, she was selfish.

  Charity had learned from Ellen that staff, with the exception of Jackson, never stayed long. Grandmother wanted Charity as a companion, a nurse and a housekeeper, someone to take over when she was too old to cope.

  As her son wheeled his chair round and made for the door, she allowed herself to look at Charity for the first time. ‘Stephen has suffered greatly since he was wounded. He lost his legs and his wife and it’s hardly surprising he’s so bitter sometimes. Until his father died a few years ago, he didn’t consider the future of Studley very much. But once he inherited it, all at once he realised what it stood for.’

  Charity frowned, not understanding what she meant.

  ‘His family were all brave, strong men,’ Grandmother went on. ‘For eight generations they’ve fought for their King and country and this house signifies their courage, fortitude and patriotism. Stephen saw himself and this house crumbling and he didn’t know where to turn. All at once he can see fresh troops: the line isn’t dead. All he has to do is make sure your oldest brother receives the right upbringing and education and Studley Priory can stay in the family for another few generations.’

  ‘You mean Toby would own it one day?’ Charity asked, hardly able to believe what she was hearing.

  ‘Well provided he lives up to Stephen’s expectations.’

  ‘And Prue? What’s he got in mind for her?’