The Maker of Swans

by Paraic O’Donnell

  She finds Eustace in his office, the nib of his pen suspended intently above a document. Without looking up, he raises his other hand to indicate that she should wait. When he has satisfied himself on some final point, he signs the paper briskly and deposits it in a drawer. Only when he has locked the drawer does he raise his eyes to greet her.

  When he does, however, Clara is surprised. The changes she has seen in Eustace have not been undone: there is a tautness about his posture still, a weariness that seems to have settled beneath his skin. But there is an ease in him today that she has not seen for some time. He has even cleared away his deepening drift of papers, restoring the desk to its customary order. She arranges her own pages unobtrusively as always, squaring them away in one corner.

  ‘Thank you, Clara. I look forward to studying today’s dispatches, though I’m afraid I don’t quite know when I shall find the time. But come in, do. I have been much absorbed by business in recent days, and I have neglected you. Let me look at you. Have you been taking your meals? I have asked Alice to ensure that you do.’

  Clara produces the roll that she took from the sideboard. She might have forgotten about it if Eustace had not mentioned it, or fed it to the ducks in the ornamental pond.

  ‘Well?’ he says. ‘A roll that is still in your pocket hardly helps your case. Look at you, you are skin and bone. You must care for yourself.’

  He grasps her wrist, holding it with the faintest of pressure, as he might a finch that he found tangled in a net. Clara offers him an unfelt smile and drops her gaze. She has spent much of the last week alone. In itself, it is not unusual, and she is accustomed to solitude. But it has been days, too, since she and Eustace exchanged more than a few words. She cannot remember when this last happened.

  Eustace grazes her cheek with his flexed fingers. ‘Clara?’

  She shakes her head and turns away, sinking into a chair by the orrery. He scans her face as he takes the opposite seat. Some moments pass before he speaks. ‘I am sorry, Clara. I have not—’

  She looks away in discomfort. Absently, she tinkers with the moon.

  ‘There are things I have not—’ He weaves and unweaves his fingers. ‘Things have not been as I might have wished.’

  She works at the stiff handle that protrudes from the base of the device. With a squeak of complaint, the small bulb of the moon pivots on its fine mechanism.

  ‘This house, this place,’ Eustace says, looking about him. ‘You have been here all this time. You have made your way in it, I suppose. You have woven your stories about it. But you have not had what a child should have. I have done what I could, but I am not—’

  He pauses, lowering his head. He studies the back of his hand, traces the thwarted course of a vein with his fingertip.

  ‘You are no ordinary child – it is not that I do not see it, only that I have never understood it. And all that I can offer you is of the ordinary kind. But you are cared for, Clara. That much I hope I can say. You are very much cared for. And will be always, even if I should—’

  Clara releases the handle and looks up.

  ‘I mean only that you must not worry,’ says Eustace. ‘I have seen to it that you will want for nothing. You do understand, don’t you? But these matters were hardly foremost in your thoughts. There was something else, perhaps, that troubled you. I have a notebook you may use if yours is not to hand.’

  She shakes her head.

  ‘Listen to me,’ he says. ‘I am talking like an old fool. Eustace, you old fool. Oh, yes. You are being polite, Clara, for my sake, but I may say it.’

  She leans across the table towards him, resting her hand on his. She traces the prominent vein with her fingertip, finding and losing its yielding rope of warmth.

  ‘It will be over soon, Clara, this business. Perhaps it will be time, then, to think of how we ought to live, all of us, whether we shall go on as we have. I know, of course, of your special attachment to this place. No one cherishes it, I think, quite as you do. But there are other places, surely, that you might wish to see. Not the fusty hotels that we have dragged you to, but places of your own choosing. In the universities, I gather, there are many young women now. Your curiosity would not be thought unusual there.’

  She turns his hand over so that his palm faces upward. So much has been hidden from her that she hardly knows what to ask. She draws a simple shape with her forefinger: the crook and tittle of a question mark.

  Eustace folds her hand in his. ‘I have kept things from you, Clara, I will not say that I have not. And it will do no good, I suppose, to tell you that I have shared far more with you than was ever shared with me, when I was your – well, when I was young.’

  He looks away for a moment, and gives a brief and almost bitter laugh.

  ‘No, it does no good. If you find it a poor answer, you are right to think so. Let me say this instead, then. If I keep things from you, it is not from any want of confidence. If all those around me had a tenth of your wits, Clara, my hair would not be as grey as you see it now. Even Mr Crowe might be considerably improved by looking to your example. Oh, it is true.

  ‘And you have given me your confidence, after all. Why, every day you entrust to me some new secret about the world that no one else could have revealed. Today, I am to learn about’ – Eustace leans towards the desk, peering at the pages she left for him – ‘the song of the white nightingale. Now that is a singular and charming creature, by the sound of it, and one I have never encountered in my field guides.’

  Clara manages a brief smile, but shifts uneasily in her chair. They are not charming at all, these pages, but strange and unsettling. Why must she show him such things, when he must have come to dread the sight of them? Why did she not destroy them as soon as she read them? Drown them. I’ll drown my book.

  ‘Do not think I accept these gifts lightly, Clara. One day, perhaps, I will show you some measure of my gratitude. It is not right that I should ask you to wait, that those who are less deserving should continue to be put before you. And yet I must ask, Clara. I must ask you to wait while I attend to these last matters, that you give me a few days more to put our affairs in order. Will you do that for me?’

  She fishes out her notebook, hesitating as she takes up her pen. She has known almost nothing beyond this place, and she cannot guess at the nature of these affairs that so preoccupy him. She knows only that they are encroaching on the borders of her world, and yet he keeps them secret from her. There are a hundred questions she might ask, but she writes nothing. She rests the pen on the empty page.

  ‘I knew I could depend upon you,’ Eustace says. He leans towards her, studying her intently. ‘And it will not be so very trying, I promise you. These guests we are expecting. They will not stay, I should think, any longer than two or three days. It will be rather dull for you, and our conversations with them may seem unusual, even a little unsettling. They spend too little time among people, and they are poor company for children – even for such a child as you.

  ‘But be patient, I beseech you. Show them courtesy, that is all, and watch how I behave. You will find it all tolerable enough, and we shall have them out from under our feet before the week is out.’

  Something occurs to Clara. Decisively, she takes up the pen again. She writes swiftly and forcefully, not caring much for her penmanship.

  I would find it more tolerable if I were not wearing that silly dress.

  Eustace reads with puzzlement at first, but winces slightly as he takes her meaning. ‘I had almost forgotten,’ he says. ‘You disapprove, then, of Arabella’s choice? I feared as much. But look at me, Clara. Look how I must dress, in dark suits always and persecuted by stiff collars. I am condemned to the appearance of an undertaker. It is only the starch, mind you, that keeps my back straight. Otherwise, I should be a hunchback by now.’

  She laughs at this, though it does little to persuade her. Eustace, she has always thought, looks rather dignified in his suit, and appears rather younger than his years.
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  ‘These costumes serve a purpose, Clara. They protect us, you know. They protect us by making us appear as we choose. Never doubt how much we are shielded by such things.

  ‘And I ask you to wear it because I would have these visitors see that they are addressing a young lady of whom they must take account. You are a person of consequence, Clara, and I will have them take account of you. Do you understand now why I ask this of you?’

  Again, she writes quickly and firmly.

  Just this once.

  ‘Thank you, Clara. We shall be allies, then, in this encounter. And afterwards, if you like, I’ll help you to burn the dress. Now, forgive me, but I still have much to do. We shall muster at dinner to face our enemy, eh?’

  Eustace gives her a fond look as she gets up, then returns his attention to his papers. Just as she is closing the door behind her, he calls out to her. When she turns, he seems uncertain, as if measuring out what he must say.

  ‘You spend your days, sometimes, among invisible things, in the world of daydreams. There is no great harm in it, and God knows I would not try to alter what is in your nature. But you must keep your wits about you, if only for a few days. The man who is coming, Clara – he wishes to settle a disagreement with Mr Crowe, but that is not quite all. He covets something that Mr Crowe has. He would covet it, I think, in anyone who possessed it, even in a child. I do not mean to frighten you, and no doubt half of these dangers are only my imaginings. Promise me, though, that you will be wary. Will you promise me that?’

  In reply, Clara holds up her palm. The gestures are slight: a wreath of small and inkless ciphers. It is a word, nonetheless. It is her word.

  Eleven

  They arrive in the last of the light.

  Clara is in the tower when the car appears at the gates. It is large and sleek, its feline greyness gilded by the November dusk. Silently, it passes along the avenue, the frayed shadows of the limes slipping from its polished surfaces.

  She is standing, not taking care as she usually does to keep out of sight. It is almost dark, and she has dressed for dinner. The ridiculous white gown that Arabella chose was not made for crouching behind battlements. She ought to hide, she knows. The urge to do so tugs at her – to drop to her knees and scramble out of sight. Yet something prevents her; something keeps her rigid and unmoving, her eyes fixed on the car. It is halfway to the house.

  She presses her fingernails into her palms.

  Get down.

  Move, she must move. These are the very people from whom the tower must be kept secret. She must move, but she cannot. She follows the quiet progress of the car, her breathing clotted and shallow. In her thin dress, she feels the cold insistence of the wind. Her bare arms are growing numb.

  Get down. Get down.

  Wolves. Clara thinks of wolves. They are alert, she has read, to movement above all else, to even the slightest tremor at the edge of their vision. Your best hope, finding yourself hunted to the edge of some Siberian forest, is to keep perfectly still, to stand at the dark eaves of the woods as they draw closer, stifling the longing to run even as they paw at the ground all around you. It is stillness that will keep you safe, stillness and the gentle obliteration of snow.

  The car draws up outside the house. There is a soft disturbance of gravel, then silence. Nothing happens for some time. No one gets out of the car. Its doors are not even opened. At last, Clara sees Eustace emerge from the house. He is followed by Alice and four other servants, who arrange themselves at either side of the front door.

  Get down, get down, get down.

  The driver’s door is opened. The man who steps out is tall and very lean. His dark hair is cropped closely, and his beard is carefully groomed. He circles the car to the rear door and holds it open, his movements purposeful and smoothly assured. There is an alertness in him that Clara has never seen in anyone. There is not a single moment when his eyes are not at work, settling attentively on each of the faces assembled before him, scanning the house, window by window.

  The passenger emerges much more slowly. He is partly concealed at first, as the tall man helps him into an overcoat, passing him a dark cane with a silver handle. The driver steps back then, and she sees a much older man. He is gaunt and slightly stooped, resting both hands on his cane. His grey hair is swept severely from his forehead, and his skin, above the dark velvet collar of his coat, has the unsettling paleness of something drawn up from deep water.

  Unlike his driver, the passenger shows no interest in his surroundings. He glances up at the reception party and lowers his head again with something like a shudder. As Eustace detaches himself to approach him, offering him a bow and some brief formula of welcome, he looks on with apparent resignation. When these formalities are concluded, he seems to sigh. He glances impatiently at his attendant.

  It begins to rain. Clara shivers, clamping her arms to her sides. Still she cannot move. The slightest stirring now will be seen. He will see it. The flicker in the changeless snow. The sudden bolt of lush fur.

  The driver addresses Eustace, gesturing curtly towards the house. Eustace regards him for an instant, his expression carefully void, then nods his assent. He directs some final courtesy towards the passenger, who ignores him and waits to be conducted to the door. As the party begins to move, the driver slips fluidly to his master’s side, shielding him with a dark umbrella.

  They proceed slowly, their pace governed by the passenger. His gait is slow and deliberate, marked by a limp he tries to mask. When they reach the steps, Eustace and the servants file into the house and out of Clara’s sight. The passenger pauses on the topmost step, perhaps while he waits for the doors to be held open. He plants his cane in front of him, cleaving the fan of light that spreads from the hallway.

  The driver pauses on the step, pivoting smartly to fold the umbrella. As he does so – dispelling its skin of droplets with a sharp quarter-turn – he looks out over the grounds, receding now into the twilight. From the beech woods, off to the west, his gaze crosses the parkland to the avenue, continuing methodically eastwards to where the lawns make their banked descent to the formal gardens.

  Clara is so cold now that she can no longer be sure that she is keeping still. Her hair is drenched, and clings in cold ropes to her face and neck. She wishes for warmth now more than secrecy. She thinks again of her music box, which she has just stowed in the walnut chest below the hatch. If she were in her room with it now, she would stroke its lid to feel the particular coolness of the porcelain. When she opened it, the dancer would right herself with a little stuttering lurch, with that faint tremor, always, of her delicate satin wings.

  She looks down again at the porch. The tall, lean man has folded the umbrella. He stands with his back to the doorway, leaving his face almost entirely in shadow. Clara cannot tell the direction of his gaze, but something has caught his attention.

  He has become perfectly still.

  Mr Crowe turned from the fireplace in the entrance hall, a heavy cocktail glass in his fist.

  ‘Chastern, you desiccated old mantis,’ he called out. ‘What a delightful surprise.’

  He wore the suit that Eustace had set out, and had consented the day before to the attentions of a barber. Arabella had not yet come down, and his attention for now was complete. He faced the room with something of his former intensity, with the almost incandescent composure that Eustace had so often seen. He thought of the salons and drawing rooms that Mr Crowe had held in fascination, of all those that had been lulled by that voice. He remembered princesses, smirched and abandoned on starlit terraces. He remembered the dogs barking behind them as they ran, and the morning coming, pale and forgiving.

  ‘Next time, though, you must let us know to expect you. We have a telephone, you know. You do know about telephones?’

  Chastern did not immediately reply. He glanced at Mr Crowe as if he were a newspaper vendor who had bawled some distasteful headline, then began a slow and methodical circuit of the hall, peering sceptically at wa
ll hangings and items of furniture. Eustace and his retinue were left to stand in awkward formation opposite Chastern’s driver, who remained impassively watchful.

  The visitor paused to examine a bust of Voltaire, drumming his fingers lightly on its protuberant crown and smirking at some interior pleasure. He struck a brass umbrella stand with his cane, as if unconvinced of its robustness. Abel flinched at the resulting clang, suppressing a slight flexion of his right arm. The driver studied him with calm curiosity.

  When Chastern reached the fireplace, he took considerable care over the selection of a chair, seating himself at last with a long exhalation. He regarded Mr Crowe briefly, then closed his eyes as if in pain. ‘Crowe, Crowe, Crowe. How I have missed the sweet salve of your wit.’

  ‘And I the Arctic summer of your charm. Join me in a drink, Chastern, before part of you peels off.’

  ‘Where is that splendid little Poussin? It hung, I believe, where you are now displaying that ludicrous trophy.’

  ‘I keep the splendid little Poussin in my private chambers. Had I known you cared for it, I might have moved it to the henhouse. This is why you must make the effort of writing a few lines.’

  Chastern resumed his survey of the room. ‘I rather think of that,’ he said, ‘as being your proper province. It has been some time, though, since my attention was last drawn to something bearing your mark. Have you folded up your tent, perhaps? Has that particular circus animal deserted you?’

  ‘On the contrary, it is a creature that refuses to be banished. Speaking of the circus, your young understudy looks as if he has thrown a knife or two in his time.’

  ‘Nazaire?’ Chastern glanced around at his attendant. ‘I’m afraid I wouldn’t know. It is not a skill I thought to enquire about when he entered my service. It is boorishness of that kind, Crowe, that makes you unfit for the academic life. Disparagement of any kind is discouraged, you know. It is rather a bore, but one becomes habituated. And as for slighting remarks directed at a chap of Moorish extraction – are you Moorish, Nazaire? In some degree, at least?’