A shape moved in the corner of the room. It was strange; Tamara hadn’t even noticed anyone else enter. But there he was again; immaculately dressed, his wide shaved head shining as if it had been polished. Palmer. He came up to her and made a small bow, stretching his meaty lips into a wide grin.
‘Such a pleasure to be back here, and in your service,’ he drawled.
He took her hand in his, bent low and kissed it.
Turning stone cold beneath his touch, she stared down at the signet ring on his smallest finger. Carved into the gold was a fox.
*
Tamara excused herself from the house as soon as she could and went for a walk towards the river. Her mind churned as she paced doggedly through the grass, gasping back tears of rage and anguish. She felt hopeless, powerless again. Since Cecil’s departure they had all lived in a magical state of denial. Sally had arrived like a gift from heaven and together they’d laughed and played and forgotten about the vile shadow that loomed over Dovestead.
But what now? What were they to do now that Cecil and, to make matters even more grisly, Palmer had returned? How stupid had she and her mother been to believe that Palmer was gone for good. Because without Palmer to hide behind, Cecil wasn’t half the menace he aspired to be. Without Palmer, his weaknesses were compromised; his shining world laid bare. Of course he had to bring him back. Palmer: the thick-necked, murdering thug. Her mind flashed to Walter’s painting. Palmer… the fox.
When she finally came to the river, she paused, panting for breath. The racing water bubbled and heaved below her. It looked just as sinister as before, but less threatening in a way. It almost seemed to be beckoning her and, for one sickening moment, she actually wondered what it would be like to jump into those cold waters and let them carry her far, far away.
She raised her eyes and set them on the grassy banks opposite. They rose steeply up, away from the boggy marshes of Dovestead and towards the lush fields of Rise Farm. How damaged that friendship was now. How she would mourn the loss of Mr and Mrs Peters and their kitchen.
Fine droplets of rain began to fall in a hazy mist. She turned back to the house. By the time she walked up the garden steps, the sky had turned deep purple and her clothes were drenched. She spotted Cecil, watching her through the drawing room window.
‘You really must learn to avoid the weather,’ he said, looking her up and down when she came in. He was tucked up in a chair, eating a large portion of Mrs Peters’ apple pie. Palmer was sitting near him, also eating some. His feet were propped up on a footstool, as if he were a guest rather than a servant in the house.
‘Very good pie,’ said Cecil, taking a mouthful and then drawing his tongue across his upper lip. ‘You enjoy Mrs Peters’ cooking?’
‘Yes. She makes excellent apple pie, as you’ve just remarked.’
‘Ah, but Mr Peters said that you were partial to his wife’s cooking. This surely means that you’ve tasted her wondrous delights before. Is that true?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, well! And may I ask where on earth that might have been?’
Tamara looked down at the floor. Large droplets of rain were trickling off her and onto the pink border of the carpet. ‘At their house. I’ve visited them a few times on my rides.’
Cecil’s eyes grew larger, and he looked at Palmer in disbelief. ‘And this was the girl who was scared of horses!’
The droplets darkened the pink of the carpet into a brownish, red colour. Like old blood stains.
‘And yet I didn’t give you that animal to abuse my trust,’ he continued.
‘I’m…I’m sorry, what do you mean?’ said Tamara, looking up.
‘Didn’t I expressly tell you to keep away from Mr Peters? To have nothing to do with that common, impudent man? I buy you a fine horse, at no small expense, and what do you do with it? You make visits to these ghastly people against my bidding and without my knowledge.’
‘But Mr and Mrs Peters are our neighbours! They’ve been most hospitable.’
‘Hospitable? And yet they cling onto their land as it if were made of gold. They spread evil gossip about me and my family around the countryside so that now no one will accept us. And you, my own wife, chooses to consort with these people.’
Cecil sprang to his feet, running his hand across his scalp. He paced the room, whistling softly between his teeth, shaking his head in disbelief.
Tamara felt her heart pounding between her ears. She pictured that rich farmland, rising up across the river beyond their own waterlogged expanse. So, that was it. That was the real cause of Cecil’s intense dislike of the Peters. He wanted their farm and they wouldn’t let it go.
‘Take my gun,’ Cecil finally said in a quiet voice. Palmer stood up and removed the gun from a drawer.
‘Shoot the horse. She doesn’t deserve it.’
‘No!’ Tamara screamed.
Palmer made to leave the room but she flew at him, grappling for the gun. She pictured her beautiful Briar, bleeding on the ground, and began to cry hysterically. Trying to attack Palmer was like wrestling a bull. His whole body was comprised of thick muscle, his neck as wide as his head. In moments Cecil had pulled her off him, his hands like vices around her arms and Palmer was gone, gun in hand.
She froze under Cecil’s touch, motionless in her defeat. She felt that if she moved again, her whole body might disintegrate. A short time later the sound of a shot reverberated through the air. She closed her eyes tightly and began to sob, thinking only of Briar’s chocolate eyes, her velvety nostrils and the warm, musty smell of her mane.
Cecil released his grip and Tamara fell forward, sobbing uncontrollably.
‘Don’t disobey me again. We leave tomorrow for our stay with the Maymonts. See that your clothes are packed.’
*
‘Can I join you?’
Sally was reading; curled up in the rocking chair with a lamp by her that she’d put on an old upturned barrel.
‘It’s very late Mrs Hearst, what are you doing wandering around this house at such an hour?’
‘I can’t sleep.’
Orange ashes glowed in the small stove that Sally had brought up to the south tower. It was warm in the room, but Tamara pulled a blanket around her shoulders and slumped down on the rug.
‘He had my beautiful horse shot. My Briar,’ she murmured. Her lip trembled.
Sally said nothing at first. Instead she watched Tamara for a long time. Her silence was comforting. It had a healing softness to it that made Tamara feel a little stronger.
‘Why?’ she asked at last.
‘Because I used to ride her to Rise Farm. Cecil hates Mr and Mrs Peters. He wants their land.’ She looked over at the book now lying in Sally’s lap. ‘I’m afraid I interrupted you. What are you reading?’
Sally closed the book, patting the cover fondly. ‘The Iliad.’
‘Poor old Hector,’ said Tamara, sighing deeply.
‘Yes, I know. He deserved better, didn’t he?’
Tamara rolled herself back on the rug next to Sinbad and gazed up at Walter’s painting. ‘It’s St Paul’s Cathedral. The fox is Palmer, the gun is my husband, the fingers are Tom’s and I am the dove. So, the only person missing who was there that night is my mother. She must be the question mark. And yet Walter has put himself there too, and Kayan: the cloak and the curled up boy. Are you in the picture as well, Sally? How do you fit into this story?’
The Welsh girl put her book to one side and joined Tamara on the floor. Her breathing was soft and measured.
‘No, I am not there,’ she answered. ‘I was Tom’s mother’s nurse. Her mind is not good, but she is safe enough at the moment in the care of some dear friends. I waited with her that night for Tom, and for you. It got later and later and my heart began to fill with dread. I knew something had gone wrong. At last Walter came back by himself. He told me that Tom had gone from us, forever.’
Her voice broke into a pained gasp. Her eyes glistened with tears.
&nbs
p; ‘Did you love him too?’ Tamara whispered.
Sally swallowed hard. ‘Far more than he loved me,’ she answered. ‘It didn’t help when he lost his heart to someone else.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Never you mind,’ she whispered, breaking into a smile. ‘She deserved him.’
Sally looked back up at the painting. That reassuring silence fell across them again and Tamara’s eyelids drooped into a long blink. How exhausting the horrors of the day had been. But then suddenly Sally’s expression changed. She wrinkled her brow and then quickly hoisted herself up onto her elbows.
‘What is it?’ Tamara asked.
‘You know… with these silly wet eyes of mine, those letters seem to stand out more. The capital H in particular. It’s the largest letter, isn’t it?’
‘They’re all different sizes.’
‘Which is the next largest?’
‘v. No, a.’
‘Yes, a and then v.’
Tamara’s mind began to spark back into life. She stared up at the letters until it seemed as if her eyes would bore a hole into the ceiling.
‘And then that e over there. That makes Have. That’s our first word. Sally, you’ve worked it out!’
Sally jumped to her bag and found a pencil. She wrote the word carefully on the floorboard. ‘What’s next?’
‘I’m looking, I’m looking. If only we could measure the letters! The next word begins with f and then a. I think. There’s not much in it.’
Sally wrote them down on the floor patiently. They materialised into: faith.
It didn’t take long to work out the rest. Finally, the completed pencil marks smiled up at them from the floorboard, as if they’d been there from the start:
Have faith in the impossible
‘How strange,’ said Tamara. ‘I should have guessed the first two words. Walter said them to me just before he left. But that phrase… it’s something my mother used to say to me all the time when I was growing up.’
‘Why did she say it?’
‘I don’t really know. I remember asking her once if I would grow up to be a princess. Instead of laughing, she looked very serious and said, “Of course, if that is what you want, Tamara. All you have to do is have faith in the impossible.”’
‘It sounds as if she truly believed it.’
‘Yes, I think she did. It was her sort of mantra, I suppose. But then she stopped saying it suddenly. Perhaps it had something to do with my father’s death.’
Tamara devoured the painting with her eyes once more. Why on earth had Walter brought this odd little phrase back to life? Her mind returned to the events of that gruesome night, when Tom had been murdered and her world had come to an end.
Have faith in the impossible
She’d seen Tom’s body lying on the floor of St Paul’s Cathedral. She’d witnessed it with her own eyes. Or at least she’d seen a body, curled up like a baby. And yet there above her was a painting of Kayan in the same pose. Kayan, the boy, who was alive and well.
She thought back to that strange moment after Cecil and Mama had drawn her out of the Cathedral. She’d spotted a figure leaving stealthily by the same door; as subtle as a passing shadow. It had been lithe and boyish. It had been Kayan.
And there above her was a picture of Walter’s cloak, billowing out with two hands gripping onto it. A musician’s hands; Tom’s hands. She pictured St Paul’s in her mind: The Whispering Gallery high up and then the alcoves buried in the walls just below it. Could it be? Was it possible? She raised her hands to her cheeks.
Have faith small dove.
That’s what Walter had said to her.
None of them had actually watched Tom fall to his death. None of them had witnessed his body crashing against the ground.
Have faith in the impossible
‘Sally?’
‘Yes.’
‘He’s alive. Tom is alive.’
Chapter 21
The journey to the Maymonts had to be undertaken by carriage.
‘It’s a charming estate; unfortunate that it’s in the middle of the wilderness,’ moaned Cecil.
Stella and Palmer would be coming too, whilst Sally and Daniel were to stay behind. How blissfully happy the next few days would be for them at Dovestead, thought Tamara, with fond jealousy. No Cecil. No Palmer. Just the peaceful, contented company of each other.
‘Please try to visit Rise Farm,’ she implored Sally before she left the house. ‘Please explain things to them.’
‘Of course,’ she responded, nodding gravely.
The carriage pulled away from Dovestead and began to clatter along the driveway. But even before the house had begun to shrink into the distance, Stella, who was sitting beside Tamara, released a great sigh and exclaimed.
‘I’m so relieved to be getting away from that panther!’
A surge of panic fired up Tamara’s spine. She looked away, hoping that no one would notice the expression on her face.
‘Panther? What on earth are you talking about?’ asked Cecil, wrinkling his brow.
‘Didn’t you know?’ she asked, eyes widening innocently. ‘Miss Trenacre has a pet black panther.’
Cecil thought deeply for a moment and then suddenly cried, ‘Stop! Stop the carriage!’
He jumped out like a coiled spring set free and paced back down the driveway. Stella made as if to follow him, but Tamara found herself putting a firm hand on the maid’s shoulder and pushing her back into her seat.
‘Stay here,’ she hissed at Stella, who looked back at her in open-mouthed astonishment. Tamara left the girl to her outrage and followed close on Cecil’s heels.
Her mind began to bubble with excuses and explanations; anything to protect her dear friends. Of course Cecil was going to find out who Sally really was sooner or later. It would have been impossible for her to have maintained the pretence of being his chosen nurse for long; especially with a great big panther as her companion. But it was heart breaking to think that Daniel might be robbed of these last few stolen days of Sally’s companionship. She wanted to kick herself; how could they have possibly imagined that they would get away with this? And poor old Sinbad … her teeth were already set on edge at the prospect of what Cecil might do to him.
They found Sally with Daniel in the dining room; eating a late breakfast and talking quietly to each other. Sally looked up as Cecil stormed in. Her back was positioned against the window, and the sunlight shone and sparkled through her hair. Her face was a picture of innocence. Even Cecil seemed slightly taken aback by this vision and paused to gather himself together.
‘What’s this I’ve heard about a pet panther?’ he asked gruffly. ‘I’ve only ever seen a panther once before in my life and that was in the company of a man I don’t care to mention.’
Sally raised her eyebrows, but the rest of her face didn’t change and she said nothing.
‘A pet panther I tell you! I’ve been informed, by Stella of all people, that there is a black panther in my house. Now, is this true?’
‘Oh,’ replied Sally, suddenly emerging into life. ‘I’m sorry Mr Hearst. I’m afraid I didn’t realise that you were talking to me! I think that you must be referring to my cat, although I’m not quite sure what you mean about a panther. Please, come this way. I think he’s down here.’
She led them to a small parlour that was rarely used. There, curled up in a comfortable chair, was a large, black cat. Tamara recognised him from the stables.
‘It was naughty of me, I know,’ said Sally, with a bashful sigh. ‘I should have asked your permission, but he’s just so gorgeous. He’s not quite a panther, are you?’ The cat purred with satisfaction as she ruffled its ears. ‘But what with the way you’re eating, you’ll be the size of one soon!’
Cecil drew in a series of deep breaths as Sally cradled the cat up into her arms. She beamed at them both and Cecil was forced to draw his hand across his scalp several times before speaking again.
‘My apologies,’ he
mumbled at last.
‘Not at all,’ replied Sally. ‘Your Stella; she’s a simple child, isn’t she? I’ve noticed that she has her funny ways. But please, don’t be too harsh with her.’
Cecil coughed into his hand and then drew it over his head yet again. ‘Of course. We will, finally, take our leave now; come Tamara. Please, keep the cat outside. I don’t like to have animals in the house.’
‘Yes, Mr Hearst.’
Tamara glanced back as she was hurried out of the room. Sally had nuzzled her face into the cat’s head, but she gave Tamara a playful little wink.
*
‘Stupid girl,’ Cecil barked at Stella, as they climbed back into the carriage. The maid looked even more baffled than before, but seemed to know better than to say anything else for now.
They rumbled on and Dovestead finally began to disappear behind them. Palmer led the way separately on a horse of his own. Tamara sat back, weak with relief. She closed her eyes, hoping to be left alone.
After about an hour of relatively calm, clear weather, the wind began to stir up. Soon it brought the inevitable rain with it. The raindrops were long and arrow-like. They began to assault the carriage, riding on the changing contours of the wind and firing at them from every direction.
Tamara could hear the horses whinnying with objection outside. The carriage began to slow down as the earth beneath it melted into mud. Glancing out, she saw great trees being buffeted; their branches writhing in protest. The air was dense with leaves and rain and anything else that the wind could scoop up from the ground.
Cecil’s face had turned green. He called for the driver to stop and then nearly fell out of the carriage to bring up the contents of his stomach by the narrow roadside. When he got back in, he was trembling like a kitten. His face was still green and beads of sweat stood up on his forehead. Twice more they had to stop in the driving wind and rain so that Cecil could retch into the road. Crawling inside the carriage again, his head lolled back in semi-consciousness, leaving his white neck exposed. Tamara stared at his Adam’s apple, protruding from his neck like a craggy hillock.
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