Two Houses, Alike in Dignity, chapter 5. A Rowansford story.

“I told you he’d be angry.” Georgina was upset, and that hurt Claire too. They’d come home from school to find their normal clothes gone, and in their place a selection of garments that had plainly come out of one of the trunks in the attic. Albert had got back at Claire by getting back at her mother and sister as well.
“I hear you don’t like your clothes and would like some different ones…” “What’s with the crazy clothes? I mean, no-one’s going to see you here, but why are you wearing them?”
For the first time since Blake had known her, Claire had lost her fighting edge.
“It was my fault. I asked Mum for some jeans – I said I was tired of the other clothes – and this is what I got instead. And Mum and Georgina as well. We’ve all got only these to wear.”
And when Blake looked at the feisty green-eyed girl he’d come to respect and admire, he saw her mother in her: the hurt eyes and the defeated droop to her mouth. It saddened him. Over the previous weeks she’d seemed happier, more positive. He'd liked hearing her stories about meeting David secretly, even told her a bit of his own experiences. And now Albert had reduced her to this.
“I’d better go – I’m supposed to be picking some vegetables for Mum. But I wanted to talk to you…I need a grown-up!” When Albert came stalking out of the house to see what Claire was doing, she was indeed industriously picking tomatoes.
“You can help your mother in the kitchen when you’ve picked these. Food needs preserving – I’m not having it go to waste. Do you hear me?”
“Yes great-grandfather.”
“And just you remember what I said to you the other day – because I meant it.”
His threats had chilled her to the bone. She wasn’t going to forget them in a hurry. Her whole weekend was mapped out for her. She and her mother in the kitchen, preparing and preserving fruit and vegetables.
“The larder’s empty. I want to see it full again. It’s time you started pulling your weight around here.”
She was to get up earlier on school days and do some work around the house before leaving. And she was to come straight home every day. She wouldn’t be able to see David at all. “That weak-willed, spineless mother of yours…it wouldn’t be difficult to push her into a complete breakdown. She’s more than half-way there already, and she’s got no strength of character, no guts. And shall I tell you what would happen next?” Her great-grandfather’s poisonous words echoed in Claire’s ears as she worked beside her mother in the already too-warm kitchen. And why wouldn’t her mother stand up to great-grandfather? His words were doing their work all too well, as Claire looked at Martha’s defeated, dejected pose and began to despise her. Why wouldn’t she just say No, enough’s enough?
“I’m still really only a child,” Claire thought, “but she’s a grown up. She should be defending me.” Claire didn’t realise how hard her mother worked, how much she tried to give them as happy a childhood as she could. Nor how much it hurt her mother to watch what Albert was doing and to be unable to prevent it. For he had threatened her too, after Timothy had been born, threatened to take her children away from her unless she did what he wanted. And what Albert wanted was Timothy. Timothy was the one who held the key to satisfying Albert’s deep-rooted desire: holding on to the farm, holding on to Nedging Tye. The pan was heavy and it took most of Claire’s strength to lift it. And she hated these stupid clothes: why hadn’t she kept her mouth shut? There were others for her to choose from: all really old-fashioned but carefully preserved. Anything to save money.
“Great-grandfather’s a total miser,” she thought. “He must be so rich by now.” Albert had sent Blake to fetch the empty crates, ready to refill them. Through the window, Blake could see Claire toiling away, and his dislike of the old man grew stronger. And where was Martha? She worried him even more than Claire did. Outside, Albert was grimly satisfied. He’d whipped them all back into shape, stopped Claire’s little rebellion dead in its tracks. And all that preserving – that should save some money too. He was ruler of this little kingdom and his subjects were going to obey him! Returning later with a crate of early strawberries, Blake knocked at the back door to deliver them, hoping to exchange a few words with Claire. But it was Martha who answered the door, and for the first time Blake actually looked her in the eyes. And what he saw there smote him to the heart. Claire had been wrong about her mother. She wasn’t too passive, she was desperately unhappy and almost without hope. Albert had done his work too well on her. A mad crazy desire to rescue her rose within him. “This place is no good for any of you. You need help to get you out of here. Will you trust me and let me help you?” The low-toned words reached Martha’s ears, and then Blake spoke more loudly.
“Strawberries. There you are.” And he swung on his heel and walked abruptly away as Albert came into earshot. Martha went into the larder to put away the full jars and fetch some more empty ones. Ironically enough, she could have enjoyed doing this, using what they’d grown, doing something creative. But not like this, not under someone’s control. And the clothes were just another outward sign of Albert’s grip upon them all. At least the girls got to wear their school uniform during the day. She'd pleaded with Albert not to do this to them all, but he’d been immoveable, making her wash and iron the old clothes.
“Unless you want to wear them smelling as they do.”
And what would he do next? He was getting worse as he got older. Could Blake really help them? She’d have to ask Claire what she thought of him. “Quickly, come with me.” Martha said to Claire. Puzzled, Claire followed her mother. “What do you think of Blake. I know none of us know him to talk to…”
“Well, actually, I have talked to him. Quite often, over these past weeks. I like him. He’s had a rough deal – his brother cheated him out of everything: that’s why he’s working here – it’s the only job he could get. Why?” “He says he wants to help us. Would you trust him?”
“I’d trust anyone who’d help us get out of here – oh no! Great-Grandfather’s coming! He’s seen us! What are we going to do?”
“Leave it to me,” Martha said.
“But he’ll want to know what we’re doing hiding away here talking in secret.”
“I know. Leave it to me.”
“And what do you think the pair of you are doing, hiding away behind here?”
Albert’s suspicious rage, and his aggression towards Claire made Martha’s mind up for her. This had to stop. And if Blake was willing to help, then maybe they could get away. She’d do anything, she decided. Time to stop Albert though. She stepped between the two of them. “If you were a woman, then you’d know that when a girl gets to a certain age, her body begins to change. And there are things her mother needs to tell her. Of course, we could have this conversation with you in on it, but…”
Claire was impressed! A crimson flush appeared on Albert’s cheeks, before he turned and stomped off in a huff. Martha had no doubt they’d be made to suffer for this later, but at least they’d got rid of him – and his suspicions – for now. “Try and get a word with Blake, but don’t let Albert see you! Tell him I’ll do anything to get you all away from here. Anything at all.” Claire’s behaviour worried David enormously. He couldn’t talk to her, couldn’t ask her what had gone wrong.
“No, I haven’t got a mobile,” she’d said. "Great- grandfather won’t let me have one – nor mum. No, you can’t use the landline – only Great-grandfather’s allowed to answer it. Of course I haven’t got internet! Computer? It would cost money!”
Jonathan Saxtead, however, was fascinated by the story Claire and David had discovered. David had raided the family bookshelves, trunks, attic cupboards and brought various diaries, ledgers and piles of papers round for Jonathan to trawl through. Jonathan had been in his element! “Some of this stuff goes way back – and your dad needs to store it better: I’ll have a word with him. I’ve found out lots I didn’t know, and I’ve easily got a talk for the next local history society meeting!” Those were usually pretty lively affairs: food and wine also featured. Jonathan had been into David’s school more than once, and had kept everyone fascinated with ease.
“So, do you want me to start with the Battisford story or the Waterfold story?” “Battisford,” David said promptly. Talking about Claire’s family made her seem closer.
“Well. The Battisfords go right back. It’s a shame Albert wouldn’t join the local history society – I don’t know why he wouldn’t. He was really rude when we asked him. Anyway – the first Battisfords were water mill owners, near the old abbey. Their first mill was near the ford that used to be there – I think their name’s probably a corruption of Abbot’s Ford – but when the first bridge was built, they moved further down stream.”
Jonathan paused, struck by a sudden idea. “We’ll get Josephine out and go there – and I’ll tell you more of the story on site. Your Hezekiah was a third son of the miller – no great shakes as a marriage prospect for a Waterfold daughter! But he rescued Arabella Waterfold from drowning. She fell in love with him, and they got married. Let’s go down to the abbey.” Getting a lift in Jonathan’s car was always fun. It was, David thought, the coolest car in Rowansford. Jonathan had restored it himself – with help from anyone he could rope in! “So, Arabella Waterfold’s here in the Abbey ruins with a party of friends, having an al fresco meal. The picturesque was all the rage at that point – Wordsworth’s Tintern Abbey, the art of the time. Nature had ceased to be something to be avoided or tamed, and become something to admire and enjoy.” “And that’s where Arabella fell in, as far as I can make out. This was the mill stream – that bridge is where the old ford used to be. The mill stream was running high, and she would certainly have drowned – and young Battisford nearly drowned himself, rescuing her, but the other young ladies of the party tied their shawls together to make a rope for him to hold onto, and helped haul him out. Let’s go and look at the mill.” The mill was old and overgrown, ivy covering the windows. The mill stream still ran past the side of the mill, though not as strongly as it would have done when the mill was working.
“It’s a bit spooky,” David said. “Who owns it now?”
“The Battisfords still do.”
“Oh – I assumed they’d sold it when they bought the farm.” “Aha!” Jonathan said delightedly. “The Battisfords didn’t buy the farm! It was a Waterfold farm. It came to Arabella and Hezekiah and their descendants, but with some pretty strong covenants attached. Your great-great whatever grandfather writes, ‘Though I find young Hezekiah to be an estimable young man with no taint of Greed or Avarice about him, yet I am not happy in my mind about the rest of the family. His father is a grasping man, and the eldest son also.’”
“Go on,” David said, interested.
“So – whoever was running the farm had to retire at sixty-five – the Battisfords tended to be a long-lived family, despite their occupation – and hand it on to their son. There was a little cottage as well – I think I know where that should be: I’m going to trace it – and they were to move there, have an income from the farm, but not interfere with the running of it. You can usually overset covenants like this, if both father and son agree to do so, but Hezekiah added a clause that the son would have to be thirty years of age before this could be done.”
“Old enough to stand up to a domineering parent,” David said thoughtfully. He went over to look through one of the ivy-clad windows.
“So what happened to the farm if there were no sons? Did the daughters inherit?”
“No. It reverted to the Waterfold family. Any unmarried daughters over twenty-one got the cottage for their life span, and an income from the farm.” David peered through the window. Plants were growing up through the floorboards and between the flagstones.
“I need to collect Daisy from the Bardens’ farm,” Jonathan said. “I’ll take you home first. She’s been round there sewing again – Alice is teaching her and helping her.”
David wasn’t sorry to leave the gloomy clearing. The sun was setting, and the many trees were casting long shadows. It had all been really interesting, and he’d loved the ride in Josephine, but it didn’t solve the problem of how to see Claire again. And he had a strong feeling that she was in trouble, that she was unhappy. He was right. More right than he realised. Albert Battisford was now tipping well over the edge of reasonable.