The Maker of Swans

by Paraic O’Donnell

  He slowed as he drew near to the ruin. It was roofless, and half of one gable had fallen in. About its lintels a faint blackening could still be seen, as if from some long-ago fire. From behind its northern wall rose the crazed splay of a young willow.

  He stopped to figure his position, taking sight lines to the church tower and as far downstream as he could see. Circling the structure from outside, he hacked at the briars that had risen about the walls. He stepped back now and then, when he had revealed some part of the choked stonework, to see if it had become recognisable.

  Crossing the threshold, he saw that none of the interior walls remained. The field had encroached on the floors, all but reclaiming them. He wandered over the rough grass, searching it for the traces of vanished rooms. He plotted out the area, bisecting it in his mind into two unequal portions. Scanning the larger of these, his gaze settled on a place at its inner edge. Slowly now, he made his way towards it. The wind was harsh, even for January. Blades of dry sedge flicked at his ankles.

  The grass straggled thinly over the place where he stopped. He scraped at it with his heel until he had stripped away a thin swatch of turf. Beneath this, he found what he had expected: a plate of blackened stone, deeply encrusted with ash and charcoal. He crouched to touch it, holding his smudged fingertips to his nose as he stood upright.

  He crossed to a vacant window in the front wall, looking up towards the road to be sure that he was not observed. Returning to the place he had uncovered, he lowered himself slowly to the ground. He tried to think of the age he had been when he could lie outstretched here, between the range and the kitchen wall. He had all but outgrown it, he remembered, even before Eleanor took his place.

  He lay on his side, folding his knees as closely to himself as he could manage. He closed his eyes, listening for the sound beneath the wind, for the slow persuasion of the water.

  The boy eyes the boat dubiously. Mr Crowe catches sight of him and claps the Frenchman’s shoulder in amusement. ‘Look, Lavoisier. Our Eustace is not reassured by the sight of your vessel. He knows an oarlock from a cock ring, mind you, so you should sit up and take notice.’

  Lavoisier, who wears the grease-stained tunic of some indeterminate military office, hurls a bolt of tobacco from his mouth and stalks away to attend to the cargo.

  Mr Crowe laughs at his retreating back. ‘It is only the dinghy, Eustace.’ He pauses, as if contemplating his own words. ‘Eustace, Eustace – I do hope it pleases you as it does me. I feel an intense satisfaction, I must confess, at having hit upon it. At any rate, the good ship Sainte-Justine lies at anchor somewhere in that interminable greyness. You did not think, surely, that we proposed to make the crossing in a rowboat.’

  The boy stares out to sea. ‘I never said I was coming.’

  ‘La belle époque, they are calling it. An age of beauty, Eustace. A gilded age. You will have seen pictures of the tower, I imagine, and it is very splendid certainly, but I will show you more than that. I will show you Jane Avril, her legs like black flames of silk in the footlights. I will introduce you to a vicomte of my acquaintance who was shot through the cheeks in a duel and now smokes his cigars through the holes. And of course we must visit Debussy, though he labours now against illness and lives in great discomfort. You have never heard music, Eustace, until you have heard him. It is made of starlight and of first kisses. It seems scarcely to belong to our world.’

  ‘I haven’t forgotten,’ the boy says. ‘I can’t forget.’

  ‘And nor should you. Have I denied what you charge me with? Have I sought to deflect you from your retribution? I have not, and I will not. Lavoisier, come here. This young man, mon ami, will have need of his weapon when we have reached France. It may be necessary for him to shoot me in the Left Bank. Will you permit it, if we entrust the rifle to you during the crossing?’

  Lavoisier looks from Mr Crowe to the boy. He searches his hair and drags a palm over his unshaven face. ‘I would say non,’ he says. ‘I would say hors de question, but if it is you he want to kill—’ He sucks at his cigarette and shrugs elaborately.

  Mr Crowe claps his hands together. The wind tugs at his dark cloak and plasters his hair over his cheek. ‘There, you see? What could be more reasonable, Eustace?’

  He turns and looks back up the beach, to the horses huddled at the foot of the cliff, to the rain massing endlessly to the north. He hands the rifle to Lavoisier.

  Eustace steps aboard the boat.

  It had not been so cold, on the morning in March when he had last visited this place. The verges were darkened now by passing traffic, and he had little hope of finding daisies in flower. He managed, after twenty minutes or so, to come by five frail specimens, their petals greyish and curling inwards. They made a poor garland, all wiry stems and barely large enough to encircle a child’s wrist. Still, he wrapped it carefully in a handkerchief and tucked it away in an inner pocket.

  When he reached the churchyard, it took him some minutes to find the graves. He was mistaken, it seemed, in his memory of where she lay, though the scheme of the place had been clear enough in his mind: the hulking transept with its blackened stonework and high, mullioned window; the shadow of the yew, blue-dark and obliquely spreading. It was the new memorials, perhaps, that confused him, the ranks of the dead that had deepened in the years of his absence.

  The gravestones too were unfamiliar. Though they had been erected on his instructions, Eustace himself had not seen them until now. Eleanor’s resting place, when he had last stood by it, had been marked only by a wooden cross. Cromer had seen to it that the adjoining plots were purchased, and that the best materials were used. He laid an approving hand on the upper edge of Eleanor’s monument. Like her father’s, it had been cut from handsome granite and bore the simple inscription he had wished for.

  The other plot, to the left of Eleanor’s, lay empty still.

  He lowered himself to one knee by her gravestone. With his forefinger, he traced the chiselled strokes and serifs, the places where her name had weathered. He unwrapped the bracelet of daisies, re-threading it where one stem had broken. He pressed it briefly to his lips, then arranged it at the foot of the stone, using a pebble to secure it against the wind.

  Eustace got to his feet, standing only for a minute or two before turning to leave. Abel would be restless by now. He would not be put off any longer.

  It was Abel he expected to see when he reached the gate of the churchyard, hearing a car pull up on the road outside, and a discreet thump as one of its doors was closed. He had followed him here from the boarding house, his trust or patience exhausted. He would want to set off directly from here, would tolerate no further diversions.

  But a second car door was closed, and another set of footsteps joined the first. He heard a man’s voice, gentle and solicitous, as if to a child. Not Abel, then. Some other visitors, though it was early still for the paying of respects, and the morning was not temperate.

  It was Cromer’s hat, absurdly, that he fixed upon when they appeared. If that was Cromer’s sunken and irregular hat, then it must be Cromer who stood at the gateway, who stilled the child gently in front of him, his hands bracketing her shoulders, Cromer who bent to her ear and pointed him out.

  Beyond that, Eustace understood nothing. He saw her raise her hand against the low winter sun, saw how thin her wrists had become. He knew her, knew every hesitant flexion of her posture, every softness and hollow of her face. He saw and knew, but he could not – even as he ran to her, as he clutched her and felt himself dissolve – he did not understand, had understood nothing, all this time.

  Clara, Clara, Clara.

  Twenty-Four

  The house, at twilight, is just as Clara remembers it. She has seen it most often like this, slipping at first light from the kitchen door, or returning at evening when the lawns are crossed by long shadows. It is at these moments that she has always loved it most, standing partly revealed in the half-light, its splendour inked among the incomplete colours. As
the car nears the end of the avenue, she glimpses starlings, venturing in diminishing flourishes from the eaves.

  They pull up on the gravel before the front door and Abel silences the engine. There is no sign from within that their arrival has been noticed. Only a few of the windows on the lower floors are lighted. Abel turns to Eustace and passes him something, a hard shape wrapped in newspaper.

  ‘For the duration,’ he says. ‘It don’t mean we’re engaged or nothing. You have your business here and I have mine.’

  Eustace glances back at Clara. ‘It is for one purpose only. I will not leave her side.’

  Abel raises his spread fingers, disclaiming interest. He nods and climbs from the car. Eustace turns to her again. ‘You are ready?’ he says. ‘The danger has not passed, but it is greatly lessened. You yourself have seen to that.’

  Clara watches as he looks over her face. She has told him all she remembers of the night of her abduction, but has shared little so far of the weeks of her captivity. Of what happened to Nazaire she has revealed only a little, scribbling oblique responses to his questions. He has understood only partly. He is struggling still with how much she is unknown to him. It is something that must wait. She leans forward and touches his face. Eustace lays his own hand over hers.

  ‘And you will stay close to me?’ he says. ‘You have no reason, I know, to trust me any longer with your safety. But it will never— Clara, I will never—’

  She raises her other hand to his cheek, effacing the tear with her thumb.

  They follow Abel up the steps. One of the great doors stands ajar, lurching sluggishly in the wind. Inside, a drift of leaves skitters across the unlit hall. Some leak or spill has left a brownish delta on the wall of the staircase. Eustace surveys the scene, his face hardening, and closes the door behind them.

  Clara caught the sound when they came in: a current of music, remote but persistent. As they cross the hallway, it reaches her again – a jazz record, she thinks, playing in a distant part of the house. The instruments are etiolated, drained of their lushness, leaving only the dark gaiety of the rhythm.

  Eustace turns to her, trusting to the acuity of her hearing. At her gesture, he leads them towards the west wing. They walk in silence, moving more cautiously as they approach the source of the music. At the doors of the orangery, he brings them to a halt, inching forward until he can see inside.

  ‘It is her,’ he whispers. ‘She is alone. Abel, we are agreed? You have no account to settle with this one? You will keep watch while I attend to this?’

  ‘Be my guest,’ Abel replies. ‘I’m here for the main event.’

  Eustace faces Clara. ‘She can do you no more harm. I will make sure of it. You need not even look at her.’

  She takes his wrist, smoothing out his palm as she chooses her words.

  I want to see her. I want her to see.

  She meets his eyes calmly, not releasing his hand until she is sure he has understood.

  He lets out a long breath, and there is weariness in his face as he draws out the object that Abel passed to him in the car. It alters him to see it, blunt and purposeful against the skin she has just touched.

  Her scrutiny makes him uneasy. ‘It is only to keep you safe.’

  She shakes her head, not meeting his eyes. He forgets still. It is not the first time she has seen him hold a gun.

  In the orangery, it is not quite dark. Above its vaulted arcade of glass, the dusk has faded to lilac and ash. Arabella reclines on a chaise longue beneath the central dome, her back turned to the door. She holds a wine glass and is smoking a long, white cigarette. The gramophone is on a table at her shoulder. As Eustace approaches her, the stylus crosses a scratchy interval and a new song begins. Trumpets prowl, low and insidious, while a male voice sidles towards melody.

  Arabella raises her head without looking around. ‘Is that you, darling? I see you so seldom now, I can hardly tell.’

  ‘Get up, Arabella.’ Eustace speaks quietly.

  ‘Oh, it’s you.’ She exhales languidly, the smoke gathering in the still air. ‘I thought you’d run away. I’m glad you’re back, I must say. Things have gone rather downhill here.’

  He stands at her shoulders. With the muzzle of his pistol, he knocks the stylus from the record. There is an abrupt swerve of sound, as if the song has been torn in half.

  ‘Get up, Arabella.’

  Carelessly, she crushes out her cigarette. She rises unsteadily, tottering as she seeks out a discarded shoe. ‘Were you always quite this rude? Remind me to speak to—’

  Clara watches her as she turns, the instant of indecision that follows her surprise.

  ‘Why, Clara,’ she says. ‘How wonderful to see you. We’ve been so terribly worried.’

  Her expression is amused as she raises the wine glass to her lips. Eustace wrenches it from her and hurls it across the room. It bursts against a veiled goddess, staining the deep folds of white marble. Without warning then, he slaps her face. She staggers a little, keeping her eyes fixed on him, keeping her hand from her face. It is like a convulsion, this abrupt violence, and seems to surprise even him. He steps backwards.

  ‘The performance is over,’ he says. ‘You may spare us your curtain call. We do not know everything yet, but we know enough. You do not address the child. You do not approach her. If you do, there will be no one who can protect you from me. No one. Do you understand?’

  Arabella straightens, bringing her livid face close to his. ‘I always told him there was something brutal in you. He would never believe me, but I could see it.’

  Eustace turns away. He takes the gramophone record from the turntable, inspecting it briefly before sliding it into its sleeve. ‘Where is he?’

  ‘Where is he ever? He is in his precious library, finishing whatever it is that the old man wants. I hardly see him.’

  ‘And Chastern? Do you see no more of him, now that you have served your purpose?’

  ‘You’ll find him there too, if he hasn’t died in his sleep or fallen down the stairs. He arrived a few days ago, and they have been meeting there in the evenings. Chastern waits for whatever scraps of pages he will show him, like a sickly dog whose master feeds it from the table. It’s all rather revolting.’

  Eustace regards her coldly. ‘Your distaste for the enterprise is late in coming. How soon will it be finished? Do you know?’

  ‘The fuck do we care,’ Abel says from the door, ‘whether it’s finished or not? This is finished, right? That’s what we come here for, to finish it.’

  ‘Another charmer,’ Arabella says. ‘It is finished, or I think it is, but he can’t bear to leave it alone. He says he’s labouring towards lastness, whatever that means.’

  ‘We will join them in the library,’ Eustace says. ‘We will have their forbearance, I trust, if we do not dress for dinner.’

  Arabella shrugs. ‘Sounds lovely.’

  ‘And you,’ Eustace says. ‘You will take your seat quietly and remain directly in my sight. You will speak only when I address you. Is that understood?’

  She answers with a parodic curtsey.

  Eustace makes a courtly gesture with his pistol. ‘Shall we?’

  The house is in decay. There is no sign now of the battalion of new servants that Clara encountered in the days before she was taken. Even Alice has gone, for reasons Eustace only hinted at. Everywhere, there is evidence of neglect. Grand chambers stand deserted and unlit, emitting the damp breath of rooms that have gone for too long without warmth. As they pass the music room, a cat glares from the top of the piano, where it crouches intently amid a drift of feathers. In the dim hallways, the surviving bulbs flicker over tables clothed in ruined linen, over waterless vases and the parched tatters of lilies.

  Outside the library, Eustace pauses by a fruit bowl. At its centre is a cluster of sunken and unrecognisable husks, their rucked skins ashen with mould. He studies them with fascinated distaste, before covering them with a discarded napkin. Arabella turns with a slow smile.
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  ‘Something amuses you?’ Eustace says.

  ‘Not anymore,’ she replies. ‘But this comes close. It upsets you more than anything else that’s happened, doesn’t it? This decline in housekeeping standards? Poor Eustace. What will you live for now?’

  He gestures with his pistol towards the doors. ‘There are certain prospects still that I find consoling. After you.’

  The library is lit only with candles. Mr Crowe, as they enter, stands at the hearth, prodding at the remains of a fire. Chastern is huddled in a nearby armchair, his knees draped in a blanket. He raises his eyes from a thin sheaf of pages, detaching a pair of halfmoon spectacles from his nose.

  Mr Crowe turns from the fireplace, still loosely gripping the poker, and stares in silence as Arabella takes the seat that Eustace has indicated. Abel saunters to an armchair opposite Chastern, where he reclines comfortably, his boots resting on a low table. He sets his shotgun on his knees and lights a cigarette, tossing the spent match into the embers.

  ‘My darling child.’ Mr Crowe turns to Clara, spreading his arms. ‘You are restored to us.’

  She moves closer to Eustace, slipping her hand into his.

  Mr Crowe turns again to the fire, agitating the dim coals. ‘And you, Eustace. It is a very pleasant surprise, of course. And I shall savour the moment all the more fully when you explain why it is that you are menacing my fiancée with a gun.’

  ‘Your fiancée?’

  ‘You are as gladdened, I trust, as I am. We thought of a summer wedding, now that the grounds have been so admirably restored.’

  ‘That is unfortunate,’ Eustace says.

  Mr Crowe tosses the poker aside. It clatters against a coal scuttle and comes to rest noisily on the hearthstone. ‘Unfortunate?’ he says. ‘Is that quite the proper form of congratulation? I defer to you, normally, in matters of etiquette, but here I feel you may have misspoken.’