The Dream Begins Read online

  ‘It’s a lot to ask a woman to leave her home, her country, and her friends. Since Betty’s mother died, her father’s relied on Betty to help him run the Boot. It was her idea to turn the attics and rooms over the stables into dormitories for bachelors. That income would go if she wasn’t there to supervise the cook and maids and keep an eye on the accounts. Her father was never any good at book-keeping. If she left the Boot she’d be leaving it for what? Life in a foreign country where no one speaks English and she wouldn’t know a soul.’

  ‘She’d know you.’ Peter was irritated by Glyn’s determination to excuse Betty’s behaviour, ‘as well as me and Sarah, there are over a hundred others in this convoy who speak English and Welsh. I’d be furious if Sarah left me to travel a thousand miles by myself so she could work in a family business.’

  ‘Sarah hasn’t a family, let alone a family business.’

  Concerned for Glyn, Peter refused to allow his brother to side-track the conversation. ‘You know what I mean.’

  ‘I know Betty’s an expert when it comes to running a pub.’ Glyn swirled his brandy around in the balloon before sipping it.

  ‘Are you saying you’re happy for your wife to put her father’s pub before your marriage?’

  ‘I’d be the first to admit I’ve spent more time travelling with Mr Hughes and working with him in Greenwich since I married than I have with Betty. These last three years there’s been so much to do to finalise the setting up of the New Russia Company. We had to order equipment for the new works, and given the extremes of Russian weather none of it could be standard because standard wouldn’t tolerate the severe frosts of Russia. It took time to work out the specification and even more time to arrange the manufacture of the components.’ He gave Peter a rueful smile. ‘I can recite the dimensions of the boilers we’re taking to Russia but I haven’t a clue what dress size Betty wears.’

  ‘Small. I know because Sarah had one made for her as a birthday present. It’s not me you should be telling this to, but Betty. You were home for over a week. Didn’t you talk to her?’

  ‘Of course I did.’

  ‘About how you felt you’d neglected her for work?’ Peter probed.

  ‘There wasn’t time.’

  ‘In a week?’

  ‘The first couple of days I was exhausted from travelling. After that, what little time Betty spent away from the Boot was taken up with shopping and packing. Once the Parry boys moved in, the remaining time simply vanished.’

  ‘There’s always bedtime. Sometimes Sarah and I spend half the night talking ’

  ‘You and Sarah talk?’ Glyn finished his brandy and lifted his finger to summon the waiter.

  ‘About everything. You and Betty don’t?’

  ‘Other than, “What do you want for dinner?” or “Do you want me to put your shirts in the laundry?” not much. Another two brandies and coffees, please,’ Glyn asked the waiter. ‘I should never have married Betty.’ When Glyn saw Peter watching him he said, ‘It was a selfish relationship on my part from the outset.’

  ‘Edward mentioned at the time he was concerned for you – both of you. He thought you and Betty were a couple of kids playing at rushing up the aisle. He didn’t believe either of you had considered what would happen the day after the wedding ceremony, let alone a year later.’

  ‘That might be true of Betty, but I assure you at the time I thought no further than the wedding night. If there’d been one girl in our circle who hadn’t adhered strictly to the moral teachings of the chapel on chastity before marriage I wouldn’t have considered putting a ring on Betty’s finger before our twentieth birthdays.’

  ‘Looking back, my discussion with Edward was more of a lecture from him on the perils of marrying young,’ Peter mused. ‘Even then, I was aiming to leave Merthyr to study medicine.’

  ‘Given your age at the time it’s strange Edward discussed my marriage with you and not me.’

  ‘Edward probably thought you’d bite his head off.’

  ‘I probably would have – then.’

  ‘You did love Betty when you married her?’

  ‘I thought I did. Doesn’t that amount to the same thing? As I’ve just admitted, lust played a large part and you know Merthyr. It was what was expected. You court a girl – you marry her. Betty was my childhood sweetheart.’

  ‘We all have childhood sweethearts,’ Peter observed. ‘Not many end up marrying them.’

  ‘You certainly didn’t marry Jenny.’

  ‘I knew I was heading for serious poverty. It was bad enough you and Edward had to support me through six years of medical studies. It would have been too much to expect you to keep my wife and possibly children as well. I thought Jenny would be best left in Merthyr where she could find someone else. I didn’t wish her ill and I certainly didn’t wish a man who’d lose his leg like Iestyn Swine on her.’

  ‘She’s surviving given the sideline she’s developed in doctoring animals. Not to mention gelding them.’

  ‘When I told Jenny to forget me I believed I was being noble and self-sacrificing. After meeting Sarah I realised I’d made the right and selfish decision. There’s a world of difference between love and infatuation. But we’re talking about you and Betty.’

  ‘There’s not much more to say other than I should have told Betty it was over between us nine years ago when I accepted the position of Mr Hughes’s assistant. It’s not Mr Hughes’s fault. He warned me the job would mean travelling with him. It was an incredible opportunity for me but I hadn’t expected him to spend quite so much time on the Continent.’

  ‘You would have left Betty after only a year of married life?’ Peter handed the waiter his empty glass in exchange for a full one. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Yes, thank you. We’ll have the bill please.’ Glyn turned from the waiter. ‘Not a year, six months to be exact.’

  ‘You knew something was wrong between you and Betty that early on?’

  ‘Truth is, probably before we walked down the aisle. At the time I was excited about only one thing – my work with Mr Hughes.’

  ‘But your wedding … the moment you put the ring on Betty’s finger.’

  ‘I can’t remember it.’

  ‘I remember every second of every moment I’ve spent with Sarah. I can tell you exactly how I felt when I saw her for the first time just over seven years ago.’

  ‘Which was?’

  ‘The world was brighter, more colourful. Truly, wondrously beautiful. It was as though I’d opened my eyes for the first time.’

  ‘Betty never made me feel like that.’

  ‘Never?’ Happier than he’d believed possible in his own marriage; Peter wanted his brother to feel the same.

  ‘I couldn’t say with certainty how much of what I felt about Betty was down to habit. Whenever I called in the Boot when I was still working for the Crawshays in Merthyr she was always waiting with a smile, a friendly word, and a pint of ale. Edward warned me that if I continued to spend time talking to her, people in general, and her parents in particular, would expect me to marry her. He was right but I ignored his advice just as I discounted most of what he told me before I was old enough to think for myself.’

  ‘I remember Edward’s cautionary lectures. Much as I love him, they’re boring and he always chose to deliver them when I was burning to do something other than listen.’

  ‘I agree with you about Edward’s “talks” but it’s all water long flowed under the bridge. When Betty or her father – or perhaps both – first broached the subject of marriage, I did what was expected of me. I saw the minister and booked the chapel. Wasn’t it like that for you and Sarah?’

  ‘No, because I didn’t want to imagine living a day without her. When I started work in the hospital, I used every excuse to visit the women’s surgical ward where she worked, just so I could see her and experience the feeling of excitement that still overwhelms me whenever I look at her. That goes for our wedding day. Every year of waiting until I qualified seemed
like a century.’

  ‘You sound like a bad romance novel.’

  ‘My lack of eloquence doesn’t make the way I feel about Sarah less real.’

  ‘She must love you to traipse all the way to Russia,’ Glyn allowed.

  ‘That sounds like jealousy, despite what you said about Betty making the right decision to stay in Merthyr.’ Peter’s smile was so disarming, Glyn had to smile back.

  ‘I am jealous,’ Glyn admitted. ‘Not of you and Sarah. Only the feelings you have for one another. The way you talk about Sarah …’

  ‘Yes,’ Peter prompted.

  ‘I’ve only ever felt that about this expedition. The thought of building something new, something huge for the future that will last long after Mr Hughes, me, and everyone travelling with us will be long gone from this earth. It’s as though we’re writing history. I know an ironworks will never be regarded as a great work of art like the pyramids, the Coliseum in Rome, or a Greek temple, but we’ll build furnaces that will dominate the Russian steppe for centuries. They’ll be the hub and originator of other projects that will change the face of Russia. Trains and tracks will cross the country, from Poland to China, Siberia to the Balkans, because of our work. People will be able to travel a thousand miles in a few days. Massive railway stations will be built to rival those in London, with iron pillars and roof supports. Have you looked – really looked – at Brunel’s Paddington? For sheer scale of engineering and beauty of design it rivals the greatest medieval cathedrals. We’ll create edifices as magnificent, impressive, and splendid in Russia. Mr Hughes and his New Russia Company are about to hurl a medieval country into the modern age, bringing prosperity, wealth, and education to its people, and we are a part – granted, a very small part – of his enterprise and his dream.’

  ‘That sounds as though you’ve invented industrial poetry.’

  ‘Mock all you like.’

  ‘I wasn’t, Glyn. Only admiring the intensity of your dream. But there’s one thing wrong with it.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘All the work is ahead of us and from what you’ve said it’s not going to be a picnic.’

  John Hughes’s convoy, Mediterranean waters

  July 1870

  It was John who suggested that Sarah assume responsibility for the women and children in his party after they’d boarded the vessels he’d chartered. She formed a women’s committee to help the stewards allocate the cabins, and organised meetings where the women could drink tea, gossip, and interrogate John and Glyn about Russia. She ran classes for school-age children so they wouldn’t slip behind with their education, and song and play sessions for babies and their mothers.

  It was Sarah who made the decision that men be kept out of the salon while the women held their meetings and women should leave the salon every night at ten o’clock so the men could enjoy sole occupancy, and as she said to John, Glyn, and Peter, ‘Do whatever it is men do when women are out of the way.’

  As Sarah expected, the men used their late night ‘bachelor hour’ to drink ale and brandy, and play cards. Richard was flattered when Glyn invited him to join them as soon as he was well enough, but disappointed when he discovered that most men didn’t discuss engineering when women were out of the way.

  Salon, John Hughes’s ship, Mediterranean waters

  July 1870

  ‘How did your talk go down with the women this morning, Glyn?’ John picked up the hand Richard had dealt. Under the tutelage of Glyn and Peter the boy was becoming a proficient poker player.

  Glyn stroked his moustache and studied his cards. ‘I resisted the temptation to tell them they’d be living in igloos and eating wolves.’

  ‘If Huw’s done his job it shouldn’t come to that. You did warn them it would be cold?’

  ‘I gave them the full weather breakdown.’

  ‘You told them about the locals?’

  ‘I mentioned there was little difference between Cossacks and the working class in Merthyr.’

  ‘Is that an insult to the Welsh or the Cossacks?’ Peter shuffled his cards in random order. He’d discovered to his cost that both John and Glyn were adept at reading their opponents’ hands unseen.

  ‘Both. I also told Mrs Cohen that she and her husband will be able to practise their Yiddish in the shtetl.’

  Richard laid down his cards. ‘I’m out.’

  Peter looked at him with a professional eye. ‘You’re paler than usual. Bed for you, young man.’

  ‘I’ll not argue, sir.’

  ‘I keep telling you, I’m not sir. It’s Doctor or Peter. Do me a favour,’ he said when Richard left his chair, ‘look in on your sister.’

  ‘Anna still seasick?’ John asked.

  ‘Today was the first day she’s kept water down.’

  ‘I’ll make sure she’s all right.’ Richard went to the door. ‘Good night, sir. Mr Edwards, doctor.’

  ‘Good night to you, Richard, sleep well. We need strong colliers at journey’s end. And tell your sister I’ve a job for her as soon as she’s fit enough to leave her cabin,’ John called after him.

  Sarah had placed Anna in a cubicle between her and Peter’s cabin and the one Glyn occupied with Richard. Anna was sharing with a female steward, a motherly soul who would have cared for Anna if she’d had a moment to spare after seeing to the wants of the more demanding passengers.

  Richard stepped out on deck and shivered. A cold breeze was blowing. Since they’d entered Mediterranean waters the daytime temperature had been higher than anything he’d experienced. He looked forward to the cool of early morning and evening but found the nights cold. He walked along the deck until he came to the entrance to the corridor that led to the cabins. He knocked Anna’s door.

  ‘Come in.’

  Anna was sitting up in her bunk reading by the light of a hurricane lamp.

  ‘You look almost human.’

  ‘I am now I’ve stopped retching.’

  ‘What are you reading?’

  ‘Jane Eyre, Mrs Edwards lent it to me. She said I should be well enough to get up for breakfast tomorrow. Look?’ she held out an empty plate.

  ‘You’ve eaten?’

  ‘Two ham sandwiches and they stayed down. I’m glad you called in. I’ve been thinking about the boys.’

  ‘They’ll be fine in the Boot with Mrs Edwards.’

  ‘I know. She’s kind, she’ll look after them as well, if not better than us, because she makes sure that all the lodgers in the inn get enough to eat.’

  ‘But you’re still worried about them?’

  ‘Have you thought they might not want to join us later but stay with her?’

  ‘It’s occurred to me.’

  ‘They’re our brothers, Richard. We should be looking after them.’

  ‘Neither of us is in a position to look after anyone other than ourselves at the moment.’ He leaned against the door.

  ‘I suppose you’re right.’

  ‘You did want to come with me, didn’t you?’ He dreaded her answer but had to ask.

  ‘I wanted to get away from Merthyr and like Mrs Edwards said, it’s a good opportunity for you, and if I become a nurse, me.’

  ‘You could have been a nurse in Merthyr.’

  ‘Not at my age.’

  ‘You could have started as a ward maid.’ He frowned. ‘About the Paskeys …’

  ‘I don’t want to talk about them, Richard. Not now, not ever. Please …’

  ‘It’s the same for both of us, Anna, we were both beaten. You do know they might not go to prison.’

  ‘Of course they’ll go to prison.’

  ‘I overheard Mr Edwards talking to Dr Edwards. Without us to testify against them in court they might be acquitted.’ He expected her to say something. When she didn’t, he changed the subject. ‘Mr Hughes told me to tell you he has a job for you as soon as you’re well enough to leave your cabin.’

  ‘What kind of a job?’

  ‘He didn’t say, but he seems kind for such an importan
t man. It might be something to do with helping to look after the younger children.’

  ‘Would I get paid?’

  ‘I wouldn’t have thought so. Not when Mr Hughes is covering our fares.’ He stepped out of the cabin. ‘Sleep tight, see you at breakfast.’

  ‘Richard,’

  He turned back.

  ‘About what happened in Merthyr, it’s not the same for both of us. You said you can’t remember what the Paskeys did to you.’

  ‘They knocked me out cold, you know that.’

  ‘They didn’t knock me out. I remember everything they did to me. That’s why I don’t want to talk about it.’

  ‘Forget them. We’ll never see them again. Get some sleep and don’t worry about the boys. Knowing those two they’re sitting up in bed right now, gorging themselves on a whole tray of Auntie Betty’s bread pudding.’

  ‘With a sugar crust, sultanas, and raisins.’ She almost smiled.

  ‘Night, Anna. Glad you’re with me.’ He meant it.

  Chapter Four

  Old house on fringe of Beletsky Estate

  Ukraine, July 1870

  Catherine Ignatova walked into the hall of her childhood home, stood at the foot of the staircase, and studied the decay. The walls had discoloured, the plasterwork was crumbling, and the few flakes of paint that still adhered to the woodwork were peeling.

  ‘I wish I’d thought of this house when Mr Hughes was here. He could have looked it over and made a judgement as to whether it was worth renovating for one of his managers.’

  Huw Thomas stood behind her. ‘I’m glad you thought of it now, Madam. Given the builders’ lack of progress, Mr Hughes will be grateful for any accommodation for the company workers. It would be dreadful if they arrived to find they didn’t have a roof over their heads.’

  ‘Especially with winter coming,’ Catherine observed. ‘Mr Thomas, please look around, give me your opinion, and be frank. I’m undecided whether to pay for renovations or tear the place down.’