The Rose Stone

by The Rose Stone (retail) (epub)

  * * *

  When Anna arrived home, a little later than usual, the odd exhilaration of the afternoon still with her it was to find Joss, unusually, already in the house.

  He did not turn from the window from which he had evidently watched her arrival. “Where have you been?”

  “To see Beth. I met a friend of hers. A quite extraordinary young woman. A Suffragist of all things. Passionately political. She lectured me all afternoon on the rights of women. Or rather the lack of them. Did you know—” Anna stopped, struck suddenly by his stance. “Joss? Is something wrong?”

  He turned. His face was set, his mouth a grim line. “It’s Boris.” The words were flat.

  She stared at him, white suddenly to the lips. “Boris? Oh, Joss – no!”

  He moved a hand in a sharp little negative gesture. “Not dead.”

  Her heart resumed its beating. “Thank God for that. But – what then?”

  For one moment pain flickered upon the impassive face. “He’s lost an arm. His right arm.”

  Anna’s hand was at her mouth. “Oh, God.”

  For a fraction of a second his head went down, his eyes closed. She was across the room in a flash, catching his hand in hers. Still figures caught in the web of light that streamed through the window they remained so, silently, for a full minute.

  “He’s coming home?” Anna asked at last.

  Joss, entirely in control of himself again, lifted his head and nodded. “Yes. He’ll be here quite soon as a matter of fact. The letter was – delayed.”

  Anna nodded. Who could blame Boris for communicating such news at the last possible moment? “I’m sorry,” she said, helplessly; in her mind as clearly as it had been yesterday was the picture of two young, shabby figures as they walked across the lawn at a little girl’s birthday party. “Poor Boris.”

  “They’ll be home in a week or so—”

  “They? Why of course, I had quite forgotten – his family.”

  “They’re hoping to stay with your father until they can find somewhere of their own to live.”

  “I’m sure that will be all right. Papa will be pleased. It’ll be company for him.” Anna turned away. “Poor Boris,” she said again, softly.

  “Anna?” The question in his voice stopped her. She turned back. He put a finger to her chin and turned her face to the light. “What have you been doing to yourself?”

  She smiled, pleased that he had noticed. “Arabella – the girl I was talking about – did my hair for me. Do you like it?”

  “It’s very becoming.” His expression had not changed.

  “She’s – she’s designing some clothes for me. Something – a little different—” Anna stopped at his frown.

  His hand dropped. “That sounds very expensive.”

  She suppressed a twinge of irritation. She could not for the life of her understand why he should act as if they were paupers. What did he do with their money? For what was he saving it? “No. As a matter of fact it isn’t. She’s a friend of Beth’s. She only works for people she – well, likes or is interested in. I can easily afford what she’s charging from the money that I’ve earned from—” she stopped suddenly, flushing “—that is, of course, if you agree? If you don’t think the money better spent elsewhere?”

  He turned from her abruptly. “The money that is yours you must do with as you think best. I want none of it for my purposes.”

  The door closed behind him. She stared at it, all the exhilaration of the exciting afternoon drained from her, and not simply by the news about Boris. “I want none of it—”

  What, she wondered bleakly, did he want? From her or from anyone else?

  When she found out it was to both their cost.

  Chapter Twelve

  Mafeking Night in London, the eighteenth of May 1900, and never had there been such a spontaneously jubilant night of celebration. After two hundred and seventeen days of siege the garrison of Mafeking was relieved and when the news was received London went wild. The hansom in which Joss and Anna were trying to make their way to Bayswater was held up again and again by the rejoicing crowd.

  “Ma-fe-king! Ma-fe-king!” There had been so little to celebrate during the first months of the war: now here at last the people sensed the turning of the tide and were openly exultant.

  “God bless Baden-Powell!” A man leaned through the carriage window and, grinning, thrust a small Union Jack into Anna’s hand.

  Laughing she accepted it. “God bless him!”

  Joss sat beside her, his head turned from her as he looked out of the window.

  “I’ve never seen anything like it!” Anna said excitedly, clutching the little flag, and leaning to the window. A man toasted the passing cab with a bottle, wiped the neck with his sleeve and drank deeply. “Mafeking!” he roared then, waving the bottle. Laughing, Anna saluted him with her flag. “Do you think everyone in London has come out into the streets?”

  Joss did not reply.

  She turned. “Joss?”

  His face was blank. “I’m sorry? I was thinking of something else.”

  “I said – oh, never mind. It doesn’t matter.” She smiled, her gaiety now a little forced. “Though I do think you might try to listen to at least half of what I say. You seem to have been in a dream all afternoon. Is anything wrong?”

  “No. Nothing’s wrong.” He turned back to the window.

  Anna sighed, absently smoothed the blue silk folds of her skirt. She had taken a very great deal of trouble about her appearance tonight, the evening of the celebration dinner that her father was giving to welcome Boris and his wife home. Beth had managed to finish for the occasion the outfit that Arabella had designed especially for Anna, and the end result, Anna knew, could not have been bettered in her wildest dreams. Arabella had cleverly combined the conventional with the exotic to produce an ensemble that was outstanding without being outrageous. The colour combination of the peacock blue and softest green flattered Anna’s pale colouring and light eyes. The pastel green blouse was loose, the sleeves flowing, the exquisite embroidery exactly matching the striking blue of the shimmering skirt. The shawl which kept the chill spring air from her shoulders was of shot silk in the same combination of colours, its silken fringe almost a foot long, upon it embroidered in silver Anna’s favourite dragonflies. A jewelled dragonfly of her own design glimmered in her softly-coiled hair. The faint blush of colour on her cheeks daringly owed a little less to nature than she would have cared openly to admit. She knew beyond doubt that she looked more attractive than she ever had in her life before.

  And Joss had said not a word.

  He had come home late, held up he said by the celebrating crowds, and had hurried straight upstairs to change. Anna, dressed for hours, had waited in the parlour, moving restlessly about the room, anticipation and excitement churning in her stomach. The electric jubilation in the air at the long-awaited news of victory combined with her own anticipation to make her tremble like an excited child. Several times she stopped her restless wanderings to peer anxiously into the mirror, tweaking a wisp of hair here, re-arranging the set of the shawl, fussing with the neck of the blouse – then Joss had hurried into the room, dapper and handsome in his dinner suit. He had stopped short, looking at her. She had waited, breath held. Then, “We’d better go,” he had said. “Half of London’s on the move and the roads are jam-packed.” She had been so disappointed she could hardly speak. Remembering it now some of her excitement seeped from her. She sat in silence, the little flag still upon her. The hansom lurched to a stop, the driver yelled something and they started slowly off again. A noisy crowd on the pavement were singing. She pitched her voice against the din. “How was Boris when you saw him this morning?”

  “As always.” He half-shrugged and his expression softened. “Laughing.”

  She nodded. “I suppose we shouldn’t be surprised that he’s taken it so well. I do admire him.”

  “Yes.”

  “And Louisa. I was so afraid
– well, we didn’t know what she was going to be like did we? We might have known that Boris would have married a winner.”

  He raised one sardonic eyebrow. “It’s a shame that everyone in the family doesn’t think so.”

  “Oh, take no notice of Alex and Alice. Anything less than a Lord’s daughter might as well be a washerwoman as far as they’re concerned, snobs that they are. I’m surprised they talk to us. Sometimes,” she added a little sourly and only half joking, “I wish they wouldn’t.”

  Joss, unexpectedly, laughed at that, a quiet unforced chuckle of amusement. Anna smiled, pleased. Joss’s eyes remained on her. “I don’t believe that I told you how very pretty you look this evening.”

  She stared at him. “No. You didn’t.”

  He seemed for a moment to be struggling for words. “Anna—”

  “Yes?”

  “’Ere we are, at last, Guv. Cor blimey, what a night, eh?” The cab driver’s beaming face appeared in the opening above them.

  Anna, accepting Joss’s outstretched hand with good grace, swallowed her exasperation at the ill-timing of life and braced herself for the evening ahead.

  Anna had been speaking the truth when she declared her real liking for Boris’s wife. Louisa was a small, extremely pretty woman, forthright, practical and sharp as a razor – all attributes invaluable when dealing with her dashing, handsome and totally impractical husband. Her vowels and her quick wits betrayed about equally her East End origins that so pained Alex and Alice. Indeed, anyone more different from Alex’s well-bred wife would have been hard to find, and Alice for one was at no pains to disguise the fact. Boris, whose cheerfully courageous acceptance of his own mutilation had won the admiration of all of them, obviously adored Louisa. He had, upon first introducing her to Anna and Joss, described her easily and with no bitterness as ‘my right arm’. Together they made an attractive and touching pair, and Anna had made no secret of her delighted approval of her new sister-in-law. As she entered her father’s drawing room now Louisa waved cheerfully from where she stood by the fireplace talking to an attentive Michael. Anna waved back.

  “Anna, my dear – how perfectly lovely you look—” Her father hurried to her, beaming, kissed her cheeks. Over his shoulder Anna saw with a small, unworthy but entirely enjoyable feeling of satisfaction the look, quickly suppressed, of blank astonishment on Alice’s face as her quick, sharp eyes took in Anna’s changed appearance. Alice herself was dressed, as always, expensively and in the height of fashion, her silk dress with its draped bodice and sweeping skirt decorated a little fussily with chiffon frills and bows, a small cream satin cape edged with sable about her slim shoulders. At her neck and in her hair she wore pearls. Her eyes uncharitable, she gestured graciously, inviting Anna to join her. Anna took the glass of sherry that a servant offered upon a tray and made her way across the room, pausing to greet other members of the family and guests on the way, enjoying to the full their expressed admiration of her changed appearance. She finally joined Alice, Alex and Obadiah Smithson in time to hear Alex say “—best damned army in the world and I don’t care who hears me say so. It may take time to rouse the old British Lion – but when he’s roused, just watch the monkeys run, eh?”

  Alice, whose sharp eyes had not left Anna since she had entered the room affected a look of superior feminine boredom. “Anna, my dear – do come and rescue me from all this war talk! Your brother has taken us through the siege, blow by blow, at least three times since we got here—”

  “Can’t expect women to understand such things.” Alex’s face was a little red. He held an empty glass. With a brusque gesture he called a tray-carrying servant near and replaced it with a full one.

  “Possibly not.” Alice’s voice was tart, her eyes repressive. “All the more reason I should think, to change the subject. Tell Anna about the work you’ve been supervising at Bissetts—”

  It was not lost upon Anna that her sister-in-law had studiously avoided mention of the peacock-and-green outfit. She suppressed a smile, letting Alex’s voice drone on, half-lost in the murmur of general conversation as he spoke of stabling and conservatories and replanted parkland and the small fortune it cost to renovate these country houses.

  From across the room Louisa’s eyes were drolly sympathetic.

  “—and what’s all this Papa tells me about your thinking of exhibiting in the summer?” With a jolt she realized that her brother had changed the subject.

  She jumped. “I’m sorry?”

  “Exhibiting.” Alex’s voice was rather more than faintly disapproving. “You surely aren’t serious?”

  “As a matter of fact I’m very serious indeed.” The words were short. “The exhibition is next month. I’ve had a silver inkstand accepted, and a couple of pieces of jewellery. I’m also designing a silver frame for something that Beth’s doing.” Despite the irritant of his patent and patronizing disapproval, she kept her voice bright. Beside her she was aware of Alice, unusually quiet, her eyes still taking in every detail of Anna’s appearance. Anna resisted the strong temptation to offer to turn around so that her sister-in-law could make a more thorough inspection, and kept her attention upon her brother.

  He cleared his throat. “Well – do you think it – quite the thing?”

  She half-laughed, exasperated. “Oh, Alex – what can you mean? Of course it’s ‘quite the thing’! I’m not thinking of exhibiting on a market stall in Whitechapel, you know! The Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society is an extremely prestigious organization. It’s a privilege to be exhibited by them.”

  “Really.”

  “Yes. Really.” Anna’s tone was short.

  Across the room Joss, Boris and Josef stood talking. Michael and Louisa were still engaged in their animated conversation beside the big marble fireplace. Louisa gurgled with sudden laughter, and finding herself attracting smiling glances she blushed a little and ducked her head. Only Anna noticed the tightening of Alice’s lips as Alex’s wife in her own inimitably autocratic way cut across the conversation to ask bluntly, “What do you think of Boris’s wife?”

  “I like her very much.” Anna’s voice was utterly uncompromising, the words as near a challenge as good manners would allow. Her eyes strayed again to her husband and her father. Joss was talking rapidly and earnestly. Her father, she thought suddenly, looked a little worried as he listened.

  The pause that followed her words to Alice was, as she had intended it to be, undeniably awkward. The glance that Alice threw her husband was graphic as words. Anna, suddenly, lost patience with them both. “If you’ll excuse me,” she said, coolly.

  “Anna, darling! You’re looking absolutely spiffing! You old dark horse!” Michael kissed her warmly as she joined them, and Louisa smiled.

  Anna laughed, her incipient bad humour evaporating. “Thank you.”

  Louisa turned to Michael. “Michael, you really mustn’t let me keep you all to myself, you know – there must be ever so many people that you want to talk to.”

  He grinned happily, cocked a cheeky blond head. “Oh, I don’t know—” He lifted a long finger, wagged it at Louisa, “You wouldn’t be trying to get rid of me, would you?”

  “Would I do that?”

  He grinned, shook his head at Anna, “Cut you to the heart these women—” he said, sorrowfully, and wandered cheerfully off.

  Louisa laughed. “He’s such a dear. But your sister-in-law has been watching us like daggers for the past ten minutes. I thought perhaps—”

  Anna pulled an unladylike face. Her third glass of sherry and the knowledge that she was drawing, for the first time in her life, admiring glances from every corner of the room, had conspired to produce a happy glow that blurred discretion. “Don’t worry about her. If you’re going to worry about what Alice thinks you’ll make your life a misery for nothing.”

  “P’raps. But I really don’t want to get off on the wrong foot—”

  Anna sensed suddenly the insecurity behind the bright smile. “It must be awful
ly difficult for you,” she said gently, “being thrown in at the deep end like this – I mean you couldn’t have expected—” She stopped, awkwardly.

  Louisa smiled. “No. We didn’t expect. But here we are, and here we’ll stay, I reckon. I just—” her eyes flickered to Alice and back again “—just don’t want to step on anyone’s toes that’s all.”

  Impulsively. Anna reached a hand to her. “Of course you won’t.” She pulled a funny little face. “No one that matters anyway! And if you do – don’t worry about it. And if there’s anything I can do to help – to make things easier for you—”

  “That’s kind. In fact – there is something – that you could tell me.”

  “Of course.”

  Louisa fiddled with the finely twisted stem of her empty glass. “It’s going to sound daft, I know – but I never know when Boris is kidding me – and you just can’t get him to be serious – and – well, I didn’t like to ask anyone else—”

  Anna waited.

  “Is it – is it true that his father was a – duke or something?” She lifted her head, her pretty face half-defiant, obviously expecting Anna to laugh.

  “A count,” Anna said.

  “Ah.” She considered this for a moment. “And now – your husband, Joss—”

  “Yes. He’s a count too, I’m afraid.” On Anna’s face was an expression of half-comic wry apology. “And before you ask, that makes me—”

  “A Russian countess,” supplied Louisa solemnly. “Blimey. Sergeant-Major Bentall’s little girl’s gone up in the world, hasn’t she? Hobnobbing with countesses and things?”

  “Oh, please don’t—” Anna stopped, catching the twinkle in the bright eyes. She grinned happily.

  Louisa rolled her eyes. “The kids’ll never believe it. A countess for an aunt! Wait till I tell them!”

  “I’m looking forward to meeting them.”

  “How much?”

  Anna looked a question.

  Louisa stood her glass upon the mantelshelf. “I promised Sophie I’d pop in about now, just to check they were all right. Want to come?”