‘What?’
‘I am going to fish in “his” lake as soon as the weather permits. That is what I am going to do.’
55
CHAPTER FOUR
Three days of very blustery weather delayed Mary putting this plan into action, but to her mama’s relief, the fourth day was marked by hazy sunshine and a light breeze, which meant that Mary ceased to wander round the house like a caged tiger. It was late in the afternoon when she put on her fishing garb, an old round gown and a pelisse that fitted very loosely at the back, and which she had laboriously adjusted so that the arm seam would not restrict her casting. She topped this drab costume with a battered straw hat with a wide brim, tied beneath her chin with ribands that were fraying at the end. Taking up her fishing basket and her rod bag, she took the rear way through the dower house garden to the little wicket gate that gave onto the main park of Tapley End. The gate had a piece of wood56nailed haphazardly across it, as proof of Lord Cradley’s determination that she should not trespass. She curled her lip at this, and moved a few yards to the side, where the hedge was very thin, and had, it seemed, recently been made even thinner. Mary grinned. Wilmslow may have been commanded to bar the gate, and had obeyed, but he was no happier with a Risley running the place than she was herself, and it was obvious that a ‘hint’ had been left. She eased her way through the twigs, muttered over a snagged hem, and then, with a feeling of mixed defiance and exhilaration, headed towards the lake.
It was not an immense stretch of water, but large enough not to be called a mere pool, and had been formed by damming a spring-fed stream that passed through the park on its course to the river. Her grandfather had been a keen fisherman even into his late years, and had kept the lake well stocked, although only she had fished it regularly since his demise. She did not fish the smaller upper pool, which lay at the base of the hill. A little jetty by the old boathouse was Mary’s favoured spot, and she knew the contours of the lake bottom there as well as the undulations above ground. On an August afternoon, this was where the trout would be.
Her well-loved rod was of red ash with a hazel top and standard whalebone tip, though only the ash was original after many breaks and hazel replacements, such as anglers were all prone to suffer, and came in three parts. It was not quite as long as many fishermen used,57being no more than twelve feet in total, but it suited her well. She put it together and attached her brass multiplying winch, which had been the last birthday gift her grandfather had given her, when she was fourteen. She always thought of Grandpapa when she fished, and although it was a solitary activity, she never felt lonely. James and Harry Penwood had fished also, in the school holidays, and there had been some pretty intense rivalry, and occasional cheating. Generally, however, it was man against fish, or in her case, woman against fish. She relished that it was something where she could be as good as, if not better than, a man, for it was not a matter of brute strength. Her father, no angler, once said that he could not see what there was to be proud about defeating fishes, which were creatures of small brain, but like all anglers, Mary knew that a fish could be remarkably clever in avoiding one’s hook, and landing a good fish was at least as skilled as returning successful from an afternoon’s rough shooting.
She assessed the weather and the water, and selected her fly, dithering between a fern fly and a white palmer, which was her eventual choice. Once everything was in place, she took her landing net to lay beside her on the jetty and made her first cast where she had glimpsed a fish rise. It must have moved on, because nothing took the bait as she drew the fly back towards her with a delicacy that mimicked an insect upon the water. Fishing demanded patience, and Mary Lound, who was impatient with people, could be very patient58with rod and line. She cast again, and her sigh was of quiet satisfaction. She could even look upon another fisherman, further along the bank, with a smile. There were enough fish for both her and the heron, grey garbed and hunched, and as intent as she upon the water.
There were two gentlemen in the yellow saloon of Tapley End, the older of the two sat reading a newspaper, one long leg crossed over the other at the ankle, and the younger, a youth of eighteen or nineteen, playing patience upon a small table. The cards conspired against him, and he laughed, and shook his head.
‘I would make no gamester, for I cannot even win at patience.’
‘I am glad to hear it … at least, that gaming holds no attraction for you.’ The newspaper reader looked over the top of the pages and smiled.
‘Fool’s game, if you ask me,’ the youth continued. ‘Not but that I think a game of piquet in the evening is a very pleasant end to the day.’
‘Is that a hint for after dinner, Tom?’
‘No, no. Though not a bad idea. I might even beat you, if I am very fortunate.’
‘There is that possibility, however small.’
Tom laughed again, stood, and walked over to the window, where the afternoon light gave a golden glow to the landscape, which was of carefully ‘natural’ pasture59dotted with trees, about whose exact position great thought had been given some eighty years previously. There was a gentle slope to the right, down to where a lake added interest to the view, with a little stone bridge across the lower end hiding the sluice beyond from the house.
‘By Jove, there’s someone in the lake.’’
What? Drowning?’ The older gentleman rose swiftly, dropping the newspaper, and came across the room.
‘Er, no, but … there must be a little jetty I cannot quite see. It is a … good grief, it is a woman, fishing.’
‘So it is. How unusual. This, Tom, is worthy of investigation. Come along.’
Mary was in a world of her own, and with a very nice speckled trout already laid upon a bed of dried grass in her basket. With a small twirl of her rod about her head in the advocated manner, she cast her line to a new hunting ground.
‘Bravo.’
She turned her head at the exclamation, not pleased with the acclaim, and rather annoyed at the level of noise.
‘Shhhh, you will disturb the fishes,’ she declared in a low, insistent voice.
‘My apologies, ma’am.’ The speaker was a young man of slender form, whom Mary would have described as still ‘coltish’. He doffed his hat, revealing a head of deep brown hair trimmed in the latest fashion. ‘We60came to see what you were doing.’
‘Knitting.’ The response was swift and accompanied by a glare.
‘My brother ought to have said that we came to see who was fishing in the lake.’ The older gentleman, a man of about thirty, had a measured voice in which Mary thought she detected an urge to laugh. He did not seem in any way surprised, however, and not at all put out. ‘One wonders how it is that you are fishing here, ma’am?’
‘I have fished here since I was twelve years old,’ replied Miss Lound, brazenly.
‘You have had permission?’
‘It was actively encouraged.’ She had no intention of apologising for her presence to strangers. She wondered why the new owner had brought friends with him upon his first visit. From her brief glimpse of him, the last thing she would have said was that he was a man of needy or nervous disposition who felt the need for support when arriving new to Gloucestershire. The gentleman was not easily put off.
