She nodded enthusiastically. ‘Top of the bill rate, but no name in the programme; but Mr Rogers said he’d make some recompense for that and that’s fine. I don’t want to be known for pantomime.’
‘When your ship comes in, Miss Delamour,’ he teased, ‘you will take singing lessons and become known as a classical singer.’
She took a breath. ‘I wish I could believe that.’
‘Go on,’ he said. ‘Get changed and I’ll wait and we’ll walk to the theatre together. And wear a warm scarf,’ he called after her. ‘We don’t want you ruining your voice and your fortune. It can be draughty standing in the wings.’
All things considered, Delia thought, the first week had gone very well. Miss Stannard was young but experienced, having been on stage since she was a child, and she was more than happy to have someone sing for her if it meant she could continue in the role. As they rehearsed together she’d listened carefully to Delia, to the tone and pitch of her voice and the way in which she breathed or paused on some of the words of the songs, and she was then able to follow her, sometimes raising her clasped hands to her face over a poignant verse, or swaying and dancing around the stage when she was happy.
There were distractions too, as Mr Rogers and Giles had said: lights were dimmed, or the comic lead somersaulted across the stage in an effort to cheer Cinderella during wistful verses.
It was a very long pantomime and Delia was not needed the whole time, but inevitably, as she watched the children, she thought of Robin.
‘Could he come to see the show, do you think?’ she asked Jenny when they met for an early lunch at the Maritime one Saturday before Delia left for a matinee performance. The hotel had become their regular meeting place. ‘Am I asking too much of you?’
‘I was thinking the same thing, as a matter of fact,’ Jenny murmured. ‘Except that I was thinking of all my nieces as well.’ She paused and looked at Delia. ‘They’ve never seen a pantomime. I suppose Robin has seen many?’
Delia shook her head. ‘Not all that many as I don’t play in them, but sometimes if he was given complimentary tickets he would go off and see them on his own.’ She laughed. ‘Sometimes he was rather scornful about them and said they were far too childish for him; and besides, he knew how all the special effects worked!’
But then the implication of what Jenny was saying made her hesitate. ‘Would Robin still be able to keep our secret if the girls came, or would he be tempted to tell them who it was who was singing?’
Jenny got up from the table to put on her coat. ‘I don’t know,’ she confessed. ‘But I wondered too, in all seriousness, Delia, just how long you are going to keep this secret? Is it fair to Robin? Is it fair to my parents? And shouldn’t my brother be told? He sees Robin most days, though he doesn’t have a lot to do with him. Nor with his daughters either, for that matter. He doesn’t interact with them as our father did with us. Da was unusual, I suppose, for not all fathers do, certainly not the fathers of the children I teach. It’s always the mothers who have to find a solution if there’s a problem.’ She sighed. ‘Like many people who don’t have children of their own, I have views on how parents should be involved with their offspring.’ She gazed at Delia, who appeared to be totally unprepared for such a conversation. ‘And I believe that the most important thing of all to teach a child is truth and honesty.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
‘I’ll tek you out in ’boat tomorrow,’ Aaron told Robin one Saturday morning as they were having breakfast.
Robin drew in a breath. ‘Will you? Really? Oh, thank you.’
‘You’ll have to do everything I say,’ Aaron went on. ‘Fishing can be a dangerous business.’
‘Oh, I will,’ Robin said earnestly. ‘I’ll sit perfectly still unless you tell me to do something.’
Molly was spooning porridge into her mouth. When she had swallowed, she said, ‘I’m coming as well.’
Robin turned to look at her with a question on his lips, but Aaron said, ‘No, not this time, Molly. I can’t look after two of you.’
‘I don’t need lookin’ after,’ she maintained. ‘I’ve been in ’boat before.’
‘You have,’ her grandfather said patiently. ‘And now it’s Robin’s turn.’
‘That’s not fair.’ She clattered her spoon into the empty dish. ‘I want to.’
‘Now then,’ Peggy said, having heard the conversation from the scullery. ‘What’s all this din? I want doesn’t get. I thought you were a grown-up girl, old enough to go to school?’
‘I am a grown-up girl.’ Molly defiantly folded her arms in front of her. ‘And that’s why I’m going fishing as well.’
‘Not this time,’ Aaron said. ‘So no arguing. You can go another day, mebbe when ’weather’s better, and I’ll tek you to Paull Creek.’
Molly pouted and sulked, but neither of her grandparents gave in to her. She had not been well behaved since her night at Foggit’s farm or whilst she was there either, and Peggy was inclined to think that both Jack and Susan had given in to her just to pacify her.
‘Perhaps you could practise your reading,’ Robin suggested. ‘Won’t the schoolmistress be surprised if she finds you can read before she has had the chance to teach you?’
The suggestion seemed to appeal to Molly, and after asking to be excused from the table she rushed off to find her reading book. When Robin
