Chapter Ten
Of Kith and Kin
If Tom had set out to surprise Sybil, he had done so. This time, he thought her silence would never end. At his words, her eyes fastened on Tom's face and then never left it for an instant. For what seemed like an age, she sat on his bed simply looking at him, open-mouthed, while her brain reeled, as she tried desperately to take in exactly what it was that he had just said.
After a long while, at length, seemingly having gathered her thoughts, she looked at him levelly. Then said:
"Tom, none of this makes any sense. If, as you claim, you are related to the Bransons from near Cork, then what on earth were you doing at Downton … working as a chauffeur? What are you doing here, working in Dublin … as a journalist? And if any of this is true, why didn't you tell me about it long ere now? And who the hell is Maeve?" Sybil did her best, but mangled the pronunciation of the unfamiliar Irish name.
"Not Ma eve, Sybil. May v" said Tom with a grin. From the livid expression on Sybil's face, he realised, too late, that he had miscalculated, had over stepped the mark. Now, he reflected ruefully, was not the time for levity … of any kind.
"Don't you get clever with me, Tom Branson" said Sybil her temper suddenly flaring. "You've a very great deal of explaining to do".
"I suppose I do" said Tom sheepishly.
"Suppose? Suppose?" You're bloody right you do" said Sybil emphatically. "And before you say anything, Mr. Branson, given all the circumstances, I have every right to use language".
Then, slowly, and with deliberate emphasis, Sybil began to call Tom every coarse name she had ever heard, making use of invective she didn't realise she even knew, but which had, subconsciously found its way into her memory from the soldiers in her care at Ripon Military Camp and to a lesser extent from her charges at Downton. There were even some Irish swear words sprinkled into her tirade learned from her feisty female patients in the hospital in the Coombe district of Dublin.
Tom tried to interject on a couple of occasions, but Sybil shouted him down into silence. After his second failed attempt, thereafter, he didn't even try to interrupt her, but let her finish her tirade.
And only when Sybil finally fell silent, did he then say, softly:
"Now, do you think we might continue this conversation downstairs, and without trading accusations or insults?"
"Why downstairs?" asked Sybil suspiciously.
"Because, my love" said Tom calmly, and with infinite patience, "I don't suppose you've had anything to eat since you got back here from the Coombe. Neither have I. I'm tired, I'm thirsty and I'm famished. And, if you don't mind, before I tell you what it is you want to know, I could do with something inside me by way of food".
"Very well. Agreed" said Sybil haughtily. Ignoring Tom's proffered out stretched hand she got up from the bed, strode across the room to the door and walked down the stairs in a high dudgeon to the kitchen, Tom following close behind.
Once downstairs, Sybil seated herself primly at the bare kitchen table. Unusually for her, she made no attempt whatsoever to help with the preparations for their meal. If Tom noticed her inactivity, wisely he forbore to remark upon it. Instead, he busied himself carrying food from the larder - some cold meats, pickles, bread and butter, a piece of fruit pie - then fetched a pitcher of milk, cutlery and crockery, and placed it all on the kitchen table. While Tom poured boiling water from the kettle off the range into a brown earthenware teapot, Sybil sat in stony silence.
"Where's Ma?" she asked at length, now genuinely concerned and mystified by the continuing absence of Mrs. Branson.
"Didn't I say? I must have forgotten to tell you" said Tom affably, placing the teapot on the table. "It must have been shortly after you'd left for the hospital this morning. Word came from the farm that young Ruari had fallen out of the hayloft and broken his arm. As soon as she was ready, Ma was off there like a shot. Aislin had called the doctor and no doubt by now he's been and set the lad's arm. The chap Ciaran sent over with the message said not to worry, that Ruari's not badly hurt, apart from his arm that is; shaken, to be sure, and a bit black and blue, but that he'd mend given time. So, as I said, nothing serious, but you know how Ma fusses. She told me that she might not be back until tomorrow. She sends her love, said she trusts us both to behave with decorum.
"Well" said Sybil with withering sarcasm, "given the circumstances, there's precious little chance of us not doing that. As I said, you have some explaining to do. And you'd better make it bloody good Tom Branson - if you don't want to find me on the next train to Kingstown and the steam packet back to England. And, even if you do, you may well find me doing that anyway".
"Indeed I have" said Tom. "But for the time being, leave it please, Sybil. Let's just eat, eh? Tea?"
A short while later, the meal over, with both of them feeling suitably refreshed, it was Sybil who spoke first.
"So, as to Maeve. I would be most interested to learn who this woman is, who thinks she can write to my fiancé in this way". From off the kitchen table, Sybil picked up the letter which she had brought with her from upstairs and proceeded to read it out aloud, word for word.
"Skerries House
County Cork
5th July 1919
My dearest darling Tommy,
I pray this letter reaches you, and if so, I trust that it finds you both keeping well and in good health. After all, in these doubtful times, nothing is certain, and now, what with all the unrest around here, the post is not what it once was. You will, I'm sure, be surprised to hear from me, but then, unlike you, I never was much good at writing letters.
I understand, from a mutual acquaintance of ours, who said he would use his contacts to arrange delivery of this letter - it's probably best that I don't say who, just in case this falls into the wrong hands - that you're back here in Ireland and shortly to be married. A local girl, is she? Well, whoever she is, she is very, very lucky. She must be someone very special to have won your heart my dearest boy, which, after all is something that I know you don't give away easily.
If only we … but enough of past regrets. I wish you well, my darling boy, I really do.
Dear Lord, what an awful time this is to be alive! One hears all sorts of dreadful stories, reads of all kinds of outrages, of terrible things being done. The papers are full of reports of lynchings, shootings, burnings, of unimaginable horrors.
I suppose, you remember the Tremaynes? Well, of course you must. After all, you can't have forgotten the day we spent there on the beach! They lived at Curraghmore, just along the coast from here. Anyway, a few months ago, because of all the trouble, they shut up the house and returned home to England, to their place in the West Country, to await better times. And now, now they'll never come back. Just last week - you may have seen the report in the Irish Times - some of the so-called Volunteers broke into Curraghmore and burned it to the ground as a reprisal for the shooting of several of their number by our army.
Down here, for me at least, life continues much as it has always done. But my real reason for writing to you, my darling boy, is this. Papa passed away last month. And while I know you had, with good reason, no cause to love him, or Mama, I don't need to tell you, what his death means for you, my dearest Tommy for me, in fact for both of us, and for Skerries.
May God keep you safe my darling boy,
With my love,
Maeve"
"So, who is she then, this Maeve?" asked Sybil with barely concealed annoyance.
"As to Maeve" said Tom, "she's my cousin". My Uncle Jacob's daughter. She's some six years older than me. She was always very fond of me she was". Tom started to grin again, and then thought better of it.
"Your cousin?"
"Yes. There are three of them. Maeve's the youngest. Then there are her two older brothers, William and Christopher. There's a photograph somewhere upstairs, of all of us, standing on the front steps to the house at Skerries. I suppose it must have been taken about 1905".
"Yes, I know" said Sybil, stiffly.
"You know?" asked Tom astonished. "But how on earth do you …"
"Don't worry" said Sybil brusquely. "I haven't been snooping amongst your things. I came across it quite by chance. It was amongst your papers … I found it when I was trying to sort them out … when they'd been thrown on the floor … on the train". I assume the man and woman standing on the steps are their parents - your aunt and uncle?"
Tom nodded.
"Yes my Uncle Jacob and his wife". Sybil saw Tom's lip curl.
"And will I be meeting any of them? Any of this mysterious family you lay claim to?" asked Sybil perfunctorily.
"I shouldn't think so", said Tom neutrally. "As you found out from Maeve's letter, my uncle died but a short while ago. And good riddance to the bloody bastard too! My aunt - Clarissa? A right cold hearted bitch if ever there was one - I assume she must still be living, hopefully decaying, down at Skerries. Maeve is there as you know".
"And, what about … Maeve's two brothers?" asked Sybil.
"William and Christopher? No, you won't be seeing either of them" said Tom emphatically.
"And why is that?" asked Sybil. "I assume they actually do exist. Or are they figments of your vivid imagination? Perhaps they're as mythical as the leprechauns in which, you Irish believe".
"No" said Tom. "They're not. At least they weren't".
Sybil noted Tom's sudden change of tense.
"Weren't …" she began.
"Both of them were killed; during the war. William at Gallipoli in April 1915 and Christopher on the Marne in July 1918, not long before the whole damned show ended".
"How awful" said Sybil, realising that she had allowed her temper to get the better of her. "I'm sorry I shouldn't have said what I did".
"Don't be sorry" said Tom. "I'm not. They were a pair of utter bloody bastards. I hated both of them. Mind you, I know the feeling was mutual". The vehemence of his remark left Sybil in no doubt that Tom meant what he had just said.
"But … but why?"
"To explain that, my love I have to tell you something else. Something I'd rather not …"
"Well, whether you'd rather not, you're going to have to tell me. I told you, Tom Branson, if we're to have a future together, you …
Sybil stopped what she was saying, seeing there were tears starting in Tom's eyes.
Hurriedly, Tom wiped his eyes.
"I remember you once telling me that Mary's first love, your cousin Patrick, drowned when the Titanic went down in 1912?"
"Yes" snapped Sybil. "Both Patrick and his father were lost on the Titanic. But, don't try and change the subject. What happened to my family … that … that has nothing do with what you're telling me now".
"It might do" said Tom softly.
"I can't see how. The loss of …"
"Loss" yelled Tom suddenly with savage mockery. "Do you know the meaning of the word, Sybil?"What a feckin' bloody stupid word to use … to hide the pain of losing someone dear!"
While Sybil was taken aback by Tom's outburst, she did not fail to notice that Tom's eyes had again filled with tears which, this time, were now spilling unchecked and unheeded down both his cheeks. She recognised the faraway look on his face too. She had seen it before - on board the Munster and when she caught Tom staring out to sea on the day of their arrival here in Clontarf.
"I was twelve years old" said Tom softly, his voice faltering, "when I, as you so quaintly put it … lost … both my parents. They were drowned - when the steamship Hilda ran aground, in thick fog, and sank off the Breton coast in December 1905. From what I've read, unlike the Titanic, the ship my parents were on sank very quickly. Hardly anyone survived.
She'd been bound for St. Malo. My mother's family came from near there - "French peasant stock as my uncle Jacob contemptuously referred to them". At the time of the loss of the Hilda, my parents were going over to visit her father - my maternal grandfather - the last of the family. Oh, I expect there are some cousins of mine knocking about over there, but that's all. I … I was at school at the time, here in Dublin".
Tom sniffed heavily, angrily wiped away the falling tears with the back of his hands.
"My father, Edward, - my mother always called him "Edouard", was my uncle's younger brother. They never got on. I think it had something to do with the fact that their father - my late grandfather - I never knew him - preferred my father to his elder brother. I think they also disagreed about the estate - how it was being run.
That rankled with Uncle Jacob; that and the fact that, unlike my aunt and uncle, my parents … had married for love. When my parents first met, my father was an officer with the Irish Hussars stationed here in Dublin, which is where he met my mother, Hélène. She was employed as a governess by one of the wealthy English families living on FitzWilliam Street. My mother's family … they were farmers certainly, but not peasants. That was just the kind of nasty, spiteful, class ridden remark my Uncle Jacob would make. Exactly where my mother's people came from, I'm not now sure. Maybe it was Dinan, but wherever it was, it was she who taught me to read, gave me my lasting love of books; my father gave me my love of history. The politics … well, that came later.
I grew up here in Dublin, not far from the Royal Barracks in Arbour Hill. My parents had no other children, although I suppose they'd have liked more. Perhaps I was too much of a handful! Anyway, after they died, there I was orphaned at twelve. Of course, my uncle and aunt had little option, but to take me in. Even so, it was obvious from the beginning that neither of them wanted me there at Skerries. Neither had approved of my parents' marriage, nor, I suppose of me - the living proof that it had taken place.
Of their children, only Maeve, I suppose she was about eighteen at the time of my coming to live at Skerries, showed any kindness to me - their young orphaned cousin. She'd play with me; take me down to the beach below the house". Tom paused. The same faraway look came into his eyes once again. "Sorry, what was I saying? Oh, yes. It was down on the beach there that I learned to fly a kite - Maeve had found it up in the attics of the house. I suppose it must once have belonged to her brothers...
Tom suddenly stopped speaking.
Sybil looked up to find he was staring vacantly into the middle distance, much as she had seen him do several times before. Evidently, he was seeing something far beyond the confines of the homely room in which they were both now sitting. While Sybil now at least understood something of the pain Tom had endured as a young boy, she thought, no knew, that there were still some things, which he had not so far chosen or felt able to tell her. Tom was obviously recalling something of that nature to mind now, and from the pained expression on his face, whatever it was, it was clearly a recollection which he would far sooner rather forget. To Sybil it was all too obvious that Tom found this particular memory especially upsetting. She saw him swallow hard as he tried to regain control of himself. A moment or two later and Tom began speaking again, his voice halting and hesitant, raw with emotion.
"There were ... there were two photographs in my bedroom at Skerries, Sybil ... of my parents. After all these years, do you know I can't even remember what they looked like? Have you any idea ... can you imagine how that feels?"
Sybil saw a deep tremor course right through him, saw Tom's eyes glisten again with unbidden tears. At that precise moment, Sybil's heart went out to him. Casting aside her anger, she rose from her chair, moved swiftly round the table to kneel by his side on the cold quarries of the kitchen floor. Slipping her arms about his neck, she held him close, while Tom's tears spilled freely and unheeded down his cheeks.
"Hush now, my darling. It's all right, Tom", said Sybil softly, cradling him in her arms.
Tom sniffed heavily, savagely wiping away the tears with the back of his hand.
"God, Sybil, whatever would I do without you?" Tom gazed back at her, his eyes red from sobbing.
Sybil nodded; said nothing, waiting for him to continue.
"As … as for my cousins, William and Christopher, they were somewhat older than me, and although you would have thought they would have known better, they bullied me mercilessly. Like their father, they treated me as if I wasn't even human. I'll spare you the details, apart from this by way of example.
During the first and only winter I spent at Skerries, small items, trinkets and the like began, inexplicably, to disappear from round the house, only to surface as mysteriously in my room, hidden amongst my clothes, in my school trunk. All my denials were in vain. I was accused of being a liar and a thief. My uncle beat me savagely. He thrashed me within an inch of my life. I bore the scars of that beating for weeks after. I still do. He treated me, his nephew, no better than he treated his tenants, and he treated them worse than anyone I've ever come across. What I saw, what … what was done to me, gave me a lasting hatred of everything about the class system.
Eventually, when I could stand it no longer, I ran away … and came back to Dublin, to a very different way of life to that which I'd experienced when I'd lived here before. I'd nothing left to lose. Those who had loved me, those who had mattered to me the most in my young life, were both dead. I scarcely cared if I lived or died.
I knew no-one in Dublin.
I survived by living on my wits. You've seen what it's like over in the Coombe district of the city, Sybil? Well, there are parts of Dublin much worse than that. I've seen things, experienced things, you can scarcely guess at. Why, I even begged in the streets for food.
Then one day, quite by chance, I met up with Donal - on Sackville Street as it happens. At that time he was driving a dray for the Guinness brewery. He took me under his wing, got me a job at the brewery, running messages. That was the start of it.
As I grew older, I found I had an aptitude for working with all kinds of machines and more specifically for driving and repairing motor vehicles. I got my first job as a chauffeur driving for a family in Merrion Square. I moved from there to a similar, but better paid, position in Rutland Square.
Finally I got lucky, and secured a post as one of the chauffeurs driving for the Earl of Aberdeen. He was Lord Lieutenant at the time. And, it was while working there, at the Vice Regal Lodge, just off Phoenix Park, that I saw the advertisement for the post of chauffeur at Downton. The rest you know.
By this time, my home was here in Clontarf - with Ma, Ciaran, Donal and Emer. One day, I was probably no more than thirteen, perhaps a little older, it was while I was still working at the brewery anyway, and Donal brought me over to Clontarf … to meet his family. His father had just died and he prevailed upon Ma - perhaps by way of a distraction - to take me in; which she did. Thereafter, she put me through night school to finish my education.
Since my parents died, Ma and all of them here are the only real family I've ever known. It was pure chance that they should share the same surname, but as you will by now have realised, "Branson" is quite a common name in these parts. All they know - about what went before - is that both my parents are dead. They know nothing about Skerries - and whatever you may think of me, Sybil, for having kept that part of my life from you, it's something I'd rather that they never know.
And now with my uncle dead, comes the greatest irony of all.
Skerries may be nowhere near as grand as Downton, although there was once, or so I believe, an earldom associated with the estate, but it was forfeited long ago. I expect it could be resurrected. It may even predate that of the Granthams, but no matter. As for the estate itself, well, much of it was sold off during the last century, to pay debts. So, all that really remains of it today are the house, the grounds, a few hundred acres, and a handful of now probably not so faithful tenants.
But while Skerries differs from Downton in so many ways, it is like it in one important, inescapable respect; not because it's a country estate, but because …"
Here Tom paused, looked directly down at Sybil, and then continued:
"… Skerries, like Downton, are entailed. And, with the unexpected deaths of my cousins during the war, and now my uncle, the estate passes … to me. Whether I want it or not, legally, Skerries is now mine.
Ridiculous isn't it? That I, with my Socialist principles should, by pure chance, have become the master of an estate, have tenants I don't want, and who doubtless don't want me, but who owe me their respect, who, as things stand, must pay their rents, and to whom I have responsibilities. All this, coming at a time in Ireland's history which places me firmly as a member of the ruling class and makes me … and therefore you by association with me, fair game for those who are seeking to set Ireland free, to rid her of people like my Uncle Jacob and everything he stood for, once and for all.
And, while it therefore may not be safe for me in Ireland much longer, this country is my home. I'll never leave. But, with what's now happening over here, given who you are, it's most definitely not safe for you. For, if anyone ever finds out who you are …"
Tom stopped, swallowed hard, and then continued, his voice faltering.
"So, if after what I've now told you, if you think I've not been honest with you, that I've misled you, if you feel you must return to Downton, much as it will break my heart, I'd understand. After all, I couldn't live with myself if anything happened to you because of your association with me".
Tom finally fell silent.
He looked at Sybil across the kitchen table, still littered with the remains of their hastily prepared evening meal, his eyes expectant, silently pleading with Sybil to give him some sign of what it was she intended to do. But, in that, he waited in vain; none came.
The silence in the small kitchen deepened, while outside the night drew down.
"Thank you" Sybil said at length. "Thank you for telling me, Tom … for finally having the courage to tell me. I realise that it must all have been very painful for you".
Here Sybil paused.
"But now, I have to think things over. You know I don't like deceit, Tom. If only you had had the courage to tell me all of this before we left for Ireland. Now … now I don't know what to think anymore. I need time. Time to decide … if …whether … we can have a future together. I'll let you know what I've decided … in the morning".
As she finished speaking, Sybil realised that the look on Tom's face was the same as it had been on that night at the Swan Inn, when following the unexpected arrival of her sisters in hot pursuit of the eloping pair of them, Sybil had told Tom that along with Mary and Edith, she would be returning voluntarily to Downton.
"As you wish … milady" said Tom tersely.
"Then, I'll say goodnight" said Sybil.
Tom did not reply.
There was nothing more to be said.