Dishonored

by Maria Barrett

  “Yes,” Jane answered, and she relaxed against him as he pushed the door shut with his foot.

  “Damn!” Phillip moved away from Jane and sat up. He stretched for the bedside lamp. “D’you mind, Janey? I don’t think this person’s going to bloody give up!”

  Jane ran her fingers along his back and then rolled over, snuggling down under the sheets. “OK. It’s safe now,” she said and Phillip switched on the light. They smiled at each other.

  “I’m really sorry, Jane.”

  She shrugged. “Go on, it might be important.”

  Phillip pulled back the sheets and stood, taking a towel off the chair and tying it around his waist. “I won’t be long.” He glanced back at her.

  “Go on!” She shooed him off and pulled the sheet up to her chin. “Hurry up!” Phillip left the bedroom and Jane clicked the light off as he shut the door behind him.

  He strode through to the hall and grabbed the receiver, really annoyed at being called at this time of night. “Hello?” It was cold in the hall and he shivered as he stood there in just a towel. “Hello?” He began to lose his patience and went to hang up.

  “Phillip?”

  Suddenly he gripped the phone, slumping back against the wall. “Christ! Suzy?” His mouth went dry. “Suzy? Is that you?” His voice dropped to a whisper and he strained to hear her on the other end. “Suzy? What is it? Suzanna?” He could hear her breathing, a congested sound, and his stomach flipped over with fear. “Are you all right? What is it, Suzy?” The line went quiet for a few moments then he heard a sob; he realized she was crying. “Oh God, Suzy. Please, please don’t cry. What is it?”

  “I saw you,” she said, “I saw you tonight, with someone, with…” She broke off and the few seconds Phillip waited seemed to last forever. “I saw you with another woman, Phillip!” she cried suddenly. “My God, I couldn’t believe it, I saw you kiss her, I saw…”

  “Stop it, Suzy!” he hissed. “Stop it!” He could sense the hysterics in her voice; he knew the signs. “Calm down! Please.” He kept his voice steady, his breathing controlled. He didn’t want her to catch his fear. “Suzy, listen to me, listen, just for a moment.” He looked down the hall at the bedroom, still dark, and willed Jane to stay in bed. He took a deep breath. “Suzanna, I made a promise to you, only a few weeks back, I promised you something, didn’t I?” He waited, holding his breath.

  “Yes, but…”

  “I said that I wouldn’t let you down, that I’d find a way for us. Did I say that, Suzy?”

  “Yes.”

  “Suzy, you have to trust me. I know what I’m doing and I won’t disappoint you, I promise. Please, you have to trust me!” She was crying still, he heard her sniff but she was calmer, he could feel it. “You will trust me, won’t you? You know that I want what’s best for both of us?” His voice had changed, he was cajoling, persuasive. “Please? Hmmm?”

  Suzanna lay her head back against the sofa as she held the receiver and closed her eyes. She trusted him, she always had, and she knew, she knew from the sound of his voice that he loved her, she didn’t need any more words, any more talk, she could tell. She had always been able to tell.

  “I trust you,” she said quietly. She felt the room spin for a moment and opened her eyes quickly. “You won’t let me down, will you?”

  Phillip heard her words slur. “No, I won’t let you down.” He shivered again, more from relief than cold. “Go to bed, Suzy,” he said. “You’re tired; go and tuck yourself in bed and try to get some sleep.”

  “Yes, yes I’ll do that. You always look after me, don’t you, Phillip?” She closed her eyes once more and felt the spinning, only she was too tired to open them again. She swallowed down the faint taste of nausea and let her head flop to the side. “Goodnight, darling,” she murmured. “I love you, I…” She dropped the receiver back into its cradle and curled on to her side. “I love you so much,” she whispered, but Phillip didn’t hear her; she had cut him off.

  Phillip held the phone for a few moments longer, then quickly replaced the receiver. He rubbed his hands wearily over his face and turned toward the bedroom. He felt sick, sick and cold and miserable but he knew he had to go through with it. He walked down the hall and softly clicked the door open.

  “Jane?” He heard the rustle of the sheets and moved toward the bed. “I’m sorry about that, Jane,” he whispered. “It was business.” And he sank gratefully into bed beside her and curled toward the warmth and comfort of her body.

  10

  THE WEATHER HAD STAYED WARM THROUGH MARCH AND INTO the beginning of April but the middle two weeks it began to rain. It rained almost continuously for seven days and as Jane sat at the table in the dining-room, the soft light of the candles flickering on the polished wood and the hum of conversation around her, she watched the water run down the long panes of glass in the sash windows and make complicated vertical patterns that merged into each other and disappeared as quickly as they formed. They fascinated her but as she glanced up around the table, she saw that her father was watching her and quickly tuned back into the conversation, smiling briefly at him for catching her out. She turned her head toward Phillip on her right, holding court, with Clare, her mother and Teddy all focused on him, absorbed in his story, and felt a glow of satisfaction. She took a sip of wine and listened.

  “So what happened next?” Clare demanded, a mixture of horror and curiosity on her face.

  “Well, the bird Colonel Mills had found was apparently one of a pair and the Indian had the other one. When he fled the state, he swore vengeance on the British and on Colonel Mills and his family for splitting the pair, killing his father and ruining his life.” Phillip stopped to take a sip of wine before he finished his tale. “And, as far as we know, this oath still exists to this day.”

  “Ooh!” Clare shivered. “How incredible! Weren’t you terrified going to India, Phillip? I would have been.”

  Phillip smiled. “I should think it’s all forgotten by now, Clare. I’m the first Mills to go there since the whole episode ‘supposedly’ happened and I’m not sure there’s any real truth in it.” He shrugged. “I should think it’s pretty safe and, of course, I’m terribly brave!”

  Clare laughed and turned to Jane. “Isn’t that the most amazing story, Janey?”

  Jane smiled. “Of course, but then Phillip has great skill at story telling.”

  Phillip placed his hand over hers and squeezed it. “Do I detect a hint of sarcasm in your voice, Jane Bennet?” He smiled.

  “No, me?” The whole table laughed.

  “And you’ve seen the bird have you, Jane, in the British Museum?” her father asked.

  “Yes, it’s very beautiful. Stunning in fact.”

  Clare shook her head. “I’m surprised that you ever went to India, Phillip! I wouldn’t step foot anywhere near danger like that.”

  “That’s why you’re not in the army,” Teddy said, smiling.

  “Did your family’s connection with India have much influence with your present job, Phillip?” Brigadier Bennet asked.

  “No, I don’t think so, sir. Of course it was useful that I had been to India when this appointment came up and that I’d some experience of the customs and culture but I don’t think I was appointed as equerry for those reasons.” He shrugged and finished his glass of wine. “Jane, that was a superb dinner,” he said, patting his mouth with his napkin. “And an excellent Burgundy, sir. Thank you.”

  “Jane is a very good cook,” Mrs. Bennet said. “She always cooks for us when we entertain, doesn’t she, John?”

  “Yes, yes she does.” He smiled at his daughter. “And Clare washes up usually. Clare is an excellent washer-upper, isn’t she, Teddy?”

  Teddy laughed. “Excellent.”

  “Now, would you like a brandy, Phillip, or a glass of port?” Brigadier Bennet stood and went to the sideboard. “Teddy? You’ll join me in a port, won’t you?”

  “Please.”

  Phillip went to stand as Jane got
up to help her mother with the plates. “Don’t get up,” she said quietly, her hand on his shoulder. “We’ll leave you to it,” she called across to her father.

  “Don’t you want a brandy, Janey?”

  Jane shook her head.

  “What about your mother? Caroline? Like a glass of something?”

  “No thanks, John. I think we’ll do the dishes and put the coffee on.” Mrs. Bennet had started removing the plates and handing them to Clare. “Make sure the fire’s stoked in the sitting-room will you?” she said, as she held the door open for the girls. ‘We’ll join you in there in half an hour.” And she followed her daughters out across the hallway and along the passage to the kitchen.

  “Isn’t he divine?” Clare whispered to her mother as Jane stood across the kitchen from them covering leftovers in tin foil and packing them in the fridge. “He’s besotted with Jane as well!”

  “Hardly besotted,” Jane called over to them. “We get on well, that’s all there is to it!”

  Caroline Bennet shook her head and continued stacking dishes by the sink. She didn’t want to get involved; it was Jane’s business and it should stay that way. She put the last plate on the pile and turned the taps on full blast to fill the sink, squirting a measure of Fairy Liquid under the running water. She hoped it wasn’t serious with Jane and Phillip. He seemed a nice enough man, she thought, as she watched the sink fill up, but Jane hardly knew him and before long he’d be off again to India and Jane would mope around the place making everyone’s life a misery. She wrenched the taps off and reached for her rubber gloves. What on earth was Jane doing inviting him down on Mrs. Jones’s day off, it really was too much. Dinner parties were all very well but only when the help was in, any other time simply shouldn’t be considered.

  “Pass me the plates, will you, Clare?” Caroline said, turning to her daughter. “And, Jane? You can dry.”

  Jane started and looked around. She had been staring out at the rain again, at the remains of it drying on the window. “Yup, sure!” She bent in toward the fridge, placed the last wrapped packet in and then closed the door. “Just coming,” she said as she straightened and she walked over to join her mother and Clare.

  “So I start feeding them in about May, as soon as the weather turns really, but I’m always careful. I measure each feed and catalogue it so I never lose track.” John Bennet broke off and took a puff on his cigar. Phillip had asked him about his roses so he’d told him, pity the young man didn’t have the courtesy to listen to the answer. He waited, finished his port and turned toward Teddy. “Pass the port please, Teddy.”

  “Certainly.” Teddy reached for the decanter and passed it to his left. Phillip glanced up.

  “I think the rain’s stopped,” he said as the brigadier poured himself another small glass of Taylor’s. “I wonder if you’d mind me asking Jane to show me your roses, sir? See what all this careful feeding has produced.”

  John Bennet smiled. He had been listening, just looked as if he hadn’t. “It’s John,” he said. “Please, Phillip, call me John. And not at all, I think Jane would love to show you the roses, she’s almost as good with them as I am.”

  “Thank you, John.” Phillip stood. “If you two gentlemen will excuse me?”

  “Certainly.”

  Phillip moved toward the door. This was a lovely room, the French cherrywood table was so finely polished that the wood glowed in the candle light and reflected the image of the rose bowl, heavy with David Austin’s Old English roses. He glanced at the seventeenth-century Dutch paintings on the walls, only knowing as much because Jane had told him so, and then at the long sash window where the garden trailed on seemingly forever outside. This was a lovely house, it was the perfect background for him, and it added to his determination.

  “We’ll be in for coffee,” he said, and John nodded. Quickly, before he lost his brandy-fueled nerve, he left the dining-room, crossed the stone flagged hallway and found his way along to the kitchen. He knocked and then walked straight in.

  The garden did go on forever, Phillip thought, as he followed Jane on past the rose beds and through an arch in the box hedge to another level of lawn, edged either side by an English country garden border, the scent of budding lavender and sweet peas, hollyhocks and honeysuckle strong in the damp, rain-filled air. He reached for her hand and she turned to glance at him over her shoulder.

  “The kissing seat is down here,” she said. “Right at the very end of the garden.”

  “Is it especially for kissing?”

  Jane smiled. “No, not especially.” They continued on, Phillip’s shoes getting increasingly wet from the grass and his socks beginning to feel clammy, until they reached the white wrought iron bench against a hedge of wild roses that grew over a bramble bush. Jane took the tea towel she had brought in her pocket and wiped the seat down.

  “Here you are.”

  “D’you mind if I stand?” Phillip dug his hands in his pocket and moved away from Jane. He glanced down at the longer, thicker grass and felt the hem of his trousers saturate. Not quite what I’d pictured, he thought. “Erm, Jane?”

  Jane had sat and was looking behind her at the bramble bush to see how much fruit it would bear that September. She turned to look at him.

  “Jane, I wanted to speak to you about something,” he said. “Something important.”

  Jane put her hands in the pockets of her Barbour and crossed her legs, the top of her welly hitting the bench as she did so. “I thought as much,” she said quietly. “It’s very unlike you to ring at the last minute and invite yourself down.” She shrugged and smiled to cover her disappointment. “What is it?” She had been waiting all evening for this, it was probably the old elbow but at least he had the decency to tell her to her face.

  “Well, I feel a bit embarrassed to be honest,” Phillip said. “I’m not really sure where to start.”

  “Just say it,” Jane answered. “Get it out in the open.”

  Phillip raised an eyebrow. “OK.” He cleared his throat and Jane thought, oh boy, how to make a right dog’s dinner of it. She switched off.

  “Jane, will you marry me?”

  “That’s OK, I was expecting it anyway.”

  “Sorry? Jane, did you hear what I said?”

  Jane raised her head; she was sick of humoring people. “No, what did you say, Phillip?” she asked with weary sarcasm; he obviously wanted to make things absolutely clear.

  “I said, will you marry me?”

  Jane narrowed her eyes and looked at him. “You said what?”

  Phillip held down an irritated sigh and wondered briefly if she was making fun of him. “I asked you to marry me, Jane.”

  Jane stared at him. “I see,” she said.

  Phillip stood where he was, his socks now sodden, and felt a spot of rain on his face. “Is that all?”

  “Well, no, it isn’t.” Jane bit her lip. “Why?” she asked.

  Phillip came over to the bench and sat down next to her. “Why do I want to marry you?”

  “Yes. Why?”

  This was the part he had rehearsed: perfectly. “Because we make a good couple. Because we get on very well, we have a lot in common.” He took her hand. “You’re intelligent, witty, attractive, kind and I think you’d make a very good wife for me, Jane.” He kissed the palm of her hand. “We’re compatible in bed as well, that’s very important.”

  Jane took a breath and held it, then she let it out very slowly, in one long exhalation. She felt momentarily shocked by what he’d just said; she felt dizzy, she tried hard to think straight. Phillip hadn’t mentioned love, but then why should he? They couldn’t possibly fall in love in a matter of weeks, love took years, it took marriage and children. What he had said made sense, they did get on well, they did have friends in common and they were certainly compatible in bed, that was something she had never expected! Love would come, surely? Love would grow. That’s how one would view it rationally. Was it possible to view it rationally, she thought, pu
tting her hand up to her flushed cheek. She looked at him.

  “What about India?” she asked.

  “You would come with me. We could get married before the end of my leave.” Phillip sensed her hesitation, it wasn’t what he had anticipated. “India is an incredible opportunity, Janey, you’ve always wanted to go there, haven’t you?”

  “Yes, but…”

  “But what? Your job? Teaching a bunch of sixth-formers how to draw straight lines, the Sommerton Water-color Society, average-age group—geriatric! Think of the painting you could do in India, Jane, thousands of years of culture for you to discover! You would love it, I know!”

  “You seem to have thought it all through,” she said, easing her hand away from him and standing up. She walked over to the gap in the hedge and stared out at the field beyond. Phillip watched her for a few minutes, then he walked over and stood behind her, encircling her with his arms. “I’ve had to,” he said quietly, “I’m thirty-five, I know what I want and I also have just two weeks of my six-week leave left.”

  “I see.”

  Phillip gently turned her around to face him. “You said that before.”

  “I know.”

  He tilted her chin up. “Face me, Janey, look at me.” He pushed a strand of hair back and tucked it behind her ear. She immediately responded to his touch. “Will you marry me, Jane Bennet?” he asked softly.

  Jane looked at his eyes, cool and gray, she studied his face for a few moments, easily the most beautiful face she had ever seen on a man and then she reached up and touched his cheek with affection. “Kiss me,” she answered. “Kiss me first.”

  “And then?”

  “And then we’ll see,” she said.

  Brigadier John Bennet carefully closed the bedroom door behind him so as not to wake Caroline and glanced down at his watch, the dial luminous in the dark; it was one A.M. He tied the belt of his dressing-gown and bent to put on his slippers. Then he crept down the stairs, missing the two at the bottom that creaked, and walked across the hall to the sitting-room. He opened the door and peered inside.