Chapter One Hundred And Seventeen
All A Question Of Trust
So now, with the earl of Grantham leading the way, followed closely by his wife, then by Tom still carrying Sybil, with Mary and Edith trailing slightly behind, followed by O'Brien who was continuously casting furtive, nervous looks behind her, and with Thomas bringing up the rear, the little group set off along the corridor towards the panelled door at the far end of the passage.
"Tom", gasped Sybil. Her arms were still clasped tightly about his neck, her breath now coming in rapid gasps.
"What is it, love?" His face streaked with sweat, Tom had his arms about her, holding her tight, her wet, tear-stained face buried close against his comforting vest clad shoulder, as Sybil tried desperately to blot out the awful scene of devastation unfolding behind her: the destruction of her childhood home.
"Wake me, wake me" she implored, as if what was taking place was nothing more than an unpleasant dream, at the most a terrible nightmare; that shortly she would awake to find herself safe in bed, wrapped in Tom's strong loving arms
"If only I could my love". Tom kissed the top of her head tenderly.
Sybil gasped, screamed aloud and clutched her stomach, as a yet another sudden spasm of pain shot through her abdomen.
Behind them, hazy trails of smoke were already beginning to swirl silently along the corridor while, at the far end of the passage a continuous shower of feather light, grey ash drifted downwards, mingling with a myriad of bright orange-red sparks, swirling in spiralling vortices of hot air like thousands of minute whirling dervishes, while all the while the heat was growing in intensity. It could, thought Tom grimly, be but a matter of time, perhaps only minutes, before the flames finally broke through the wooden floor from below. He thought it very doubtful if the fire brigade of which Thomas had spoken would arrive in time. For, unless they did so very quickly, Downton Abbey would be nothing more than a gutted, smoking shell.
Reaching the door at the far end of the passage, Robert paused and half turned to face them all.
"Beyond here we can make use the flight of servants' stairs to reach the ground floor of the house. Isn't that so Thomas?"
"Yes milord. But it may be that..."
"But it may be what?" asked Robert. He had grasped hold of the door handle and was, already, in the act of turning it. Nothing happened. The door refused to open. Robert tried again. Still the door refused to open.
Behind them, the smoke had thickened perceptibly, thick and acrid, was even now drifting down the corridor towards them, surging up from below, above which could be heard the continual crackle and roar of flames punctuated by the sound of breaking glass as yet more windows feet shattered in the intense heat of the fire.
Robert continued to rattle the door handle, and to no effect whatsoever.
"I don't understand. Why won't this door open?"
"Beg pardon, milord, but unless there are guests staying overnight, Mrs. Hughes always keeps that door locked", ventured Thomas. Heedless of to whom he was speaking, Thomas coughed and spat. The smoke in the corridor was growing ever worse.
"Locked? Why? What on earth for?" Robert sounded aghast, realisation now dawning that he had led his entire family into a blind alley, with no way out. Glancing down the corridor he could see that, with every passing minute, the smoke was becoming ever denser.
"Apparently, milord, many years ago, during the time your father was earl, there was, I understand some unpleasantness involving a housemaid and a male guest staying here at the abbey", explained O'Brien, likewise between repeated coughs.
"Unpleasantness? What on earth do you mean?" demanded Robert
"Oh, Robert don't be so naïve! In any case, does it really matter? The question is what on earth do we do now?" asked Cora, her voice rising impatiently.
Meanwhile, casting about for anything that might give them a ray of hope out of the present impasse, seeing that, fortuitously, there was a chair standing conveniently nearby, Tom asked Sybil if but for a moment she would be able to sit down. When she demurred, seemed disinclined to do so, was reluctant to release her arms from about his neck, Tom said it would only be for so long as he made to see what, if anything, he could try and do about the seemingly insurmountable locked door.
This notwithstanding, Sybil still proved extremely unwilling to loose her arms from about his neck, eventually agreeing to do what he had asked of her, but only assenting when, completely heedless of the presence of both her parents and two sisters, let alone O'Brien and Thomas, in order to try and calm her fears, he murmured heartfelt, intimate words of endearment to Sybil, repeatedly kissing her tear-stained face over and over again. Then and only then did Tom manage finally to convince her that he would be still right there beside her, that he had no intention of going anywhere, except with her.
At that, Mary and Edith exchanged brief, knowing glances, fully aware as they were of the depth of the love existing between Tom and Sybil, while at the same time, unable to deny the truth of his own eyes, saw recognition finally dawning in the face of their own father, now realising that all he been told by both Mary and Edith ever since their return from Ireland about darling Sybil's love for this young man and his for her, was exactly as both Robert's elder two daughters had said.
Now, as the smoke haze deepened about them, making them all choke and cough, along with their mother, all three of them kneeling beside Sybil, both Mary and Edith did their very best to assuage her fears, to try to distract her, although, with every minute that passed, with yet further spasms of pain wracking her body, her hands enfolding her swollen belly, Sybil seemed to be becoming increasingly disorientated, on occasions, not to even recognise who they were, making her two sisters fear that she was becoming delirious. Even Cora, who had nursed Sybil through a variety of child and girlhood ailments, now found her unerring soothing all too fallible, was cut to the very quick on hearing Sybil in pain cry out not for her, but, instead, for Tom.
As for the young Irishman himself, his throat raw, his breath now coming in rapid, wheezing gasps, tears of frustration mingling with the grime and sweat now coating his face, helped by Thomas, who like anyone else had a finely honed, strong and over-riding interest in self-preservation, once more, Tom placed his shoulder firmly against the door and heaved with all his might, joined in his endeavours by Thomas who was prepared, if only for the instant, to put all thoughts of personal animosity aside.
It was no earthly use: for, despite the combined efforts of both Tom and the footman, even with the earl of Grantham deigning to lend his assistance, the door simply refused to budge. Nor had any of their oft-repeated cries for help been heard. After all, how could they be, above the incessant roar of the ever advancing flames? Doubled up and moaning in pain, Sybil had slipped from the chair and had sunk to the floor, her hands tightly enfolding her swollen belly. Tom was beside her in an instant, kneeling on the floor, gathering her to him in his arms, again covering her face in kisses, murmuring yet more words of endearment, but nothing he said or did seemed to make the slightest difference.
It was just then, above his head, that glancing up, Tom saw the window, one of several that lighted the passage. At least opening it would admit some fresh air, allow them all to breathe freely, cursed himself silently for not having done so earlier. Standing up, he loosened the catch, allowed the window to swing wide open, letting in a chill blast of cold night air into the corridor, which, if only for the moment, at least helped to dissipate some of the smoke swirling into the confines of the passage.
Leaning out of the window, Tom saw, but a matter of a few feet below him a narrow, flat strip of lead, no more than three or so feet wide, beneath which there lay a steeply pitched tiled roof which disappeared downwards into the blackness of the night. The flat area of lead led along the base of the wall, past the locked door and vanished beyond it into the darkness. By craning his neck, Tom saw that, just beyond the locked door, there was another window similar in both appearance and size to the one he was looking out of now. Providentially, that self-same window stood ajar.
"Where does that window open into?" he asked quickly. Alongside Tom, Thomas stuck his head out into the night air, then inhaled deeply.
"You mean the next one along from here?"
"Yes".
"Why, into this passage of course, beyond the door, at the top of the back stairs".
"Are you sure?"
Thomas nodded his head; looked superciliously at the former chauffeur.
"Of course I'm sure. Why on earth wouldn't I be?"
"How so?"
Thomas ghosted a grim smile.
"When I first came here as hall boy and then as footman, when I was...er... working upstairs, if ever I wanted a quick smoke, then it was over through there, at the top of the back stairs, with the window open".
Thomas grinned, the smile fading instantly from his face, as in the half-light of the smoke-filled passage he saw the earl of Grantham grimace; realised that he had blundered, had said far too much. Those self-same back stairs also gave access to the bedrooms of the Bachelors' Wing. Thomas's predilection for the male of the species was well-known and none of his domestic duties, either as a young hall boy or later as a footman would, legitimately, have necessitated his presence upstairs and in this part of the house.
Unaware of the implications of what Thomas had just said, Tom merely nodded and, if he realised what his father-in-law was thinking, he gave no sign of it.
"Then that's our way out of here" said Tom quietly. "Out through this window, along the roof, climb back into this passage through the next window along beyond this door and then down the back stairs".
"Don't be ridiculous Bran..." began Robert. "I'm sorry... Tom. We can't go climbing across the roof in the dark. And even if we could, then what about Cora and the girls? What about Sybil?"
Veiled by the smoky darkness, O'Brien scowled. That His Lordship had not even seen fit to make mention of her along with the other women folk here present merely served to confirm, in her own opinion, just how little she or any of the rest of the domestic staff actually mattered to the family they served.
"They'll be all right. It won't be easy for them, I grant you; for any of us in fact, but it's only a few feet and, after all, just what alternative do we have?" Tom had turned his head, was looking aghast back down the passage, saw Robert's eyes widen, now seeing what Tom himself had just seen. Amongst all the smoke, the first flickering tongues of fire and flame had appeared at the far end of the corridor.
"Tom's right, Papa. We don't have any choice" pleaded Mary.
"No, we don't. Tom saved all of us once before, when we were in Dublin. So, if he now says that the only way out is through that window and across the roof, then I'm willing to try it. I trust him implicitly. And so should you, Papa", added Edith, smiling shyly at her brother-in-law. Ever since Tom had rescued both her and Sybil from the devastation wrought in the dining room in the aftermath of the explosion at the Shelbourne Hotel, Edith had the warmest of feelings for her handsome, Irish brother-in-law. As darling Matthew had so acutely observed, Tom was a very good man to have around in a crisis.
Tom smiled briefly at Edith, mouthed his silent thanks.
"Right then, I'll go first and make sure that the far window isn't jammed and that we can get through it" said Tom. He knelt beside Sybil. For the moment, her labour pains had all but subsided, although both of them knew it could be only a brief respite before they began again. Sybil plucked nervously at the buttons of Tom's vest.
"You know I have to do this, don't you?" he asked searching her face.
Sybil nodded at him dumbly.
"But why must..."
"Love, we haven't come this far, you and I simply to die here in some smoke-filled passage! I won't allow that to happen, to you, to our child, to me, to any of us!"
There was no doubting that Tom meant every word of what he had just said. Recognising Tom's sincerity, in an open display of support, Robert now reached down and grasped his son-in-law firmly by his shoulder, but even if he was aware of the gesture, Tom took no notice, for now was not the time for such long overdue pleasantries. Instead, as always, Tom's only concern was for Sybil. He cupped her face tenderly in both his hands.
"As in everything, I need you to be with me in this".
"But Tom..."
"Do you trust me?"
"Do you need to ask that of me? Of course I trust you".
"Well then..."
"But all the same please, please, take care of yourself, my love". Sybil enfolded Tom's hands in her own.
"You know me!" Tom cupped her face in his hands, grinned his endearing lop-sided grin.
"Yes, I do. And that's why I..." began Sybil.
"Darlin' of course I will for sure. I'll be back before you know it!" Tom kissed her forehead tenderly, then rose to his feet. Placing the chair on which she had been seated directly beneath the window he climbed up on to it and then heaved himself out of the opening. Having let himself down onto the leads, Tom looked back in through the window, grinned at them all, and smiled warmly down at Sybil who had struggled to her feet, was standing just below him.
"There now, darlin'. That wasn't so difficult for sure!" Tom smiled again.
Reaching through the open window, she gently grasped hold of his shoulder.
"Please Tom, please be careful" cautioned Sybil once again.
"Darlin', I'll be back in a jiffy". Likewise gently, Tom lifted Sybil's hand from off his shoulder, raised it to his mouth, and kissed the tips of her fingers with his lips. As he did so, he was conscious of Cora standing watching both of them intently from out of the darkness of the smoke-filled shadows. Then, letting go of Sybil's hand, nodding curtly to his mother-in-law,Tom set off, treading cautiously along the narrow ledge, bound for the far window.
Outside, in the chill of the night air, in the shadow of the tall stone chimneys of the abbey, the frost still lingered. Rain had fallen earlier in the day and had now frozen, turned to sheet ice, invisible in the darkness, making any attempted passage across the roof a glacial hell for the unwary.