Louisa Elliott

by Ann Victoria Roberts

  He followed her to the foot of a broad, cantilevered staircase; then stopped with an apologetic shake of the head. ‘I find stairs very fatiguing. Do you think I could wait here?’

  The girl’s quick glance seemed to take in, for the first time, the useless left arm in its sling; with a nod she ascended the stairs alone. As he watched that slight figure in ill-fitting black, he wondered what other duties she performed in this strange household. The circumstances could not have been more different, yet he was suddenly reminded of his visit to Mrs Dodsworth’s years before; and the little servant girl whose presence had filled him with such revulsion. He could not help feeling, however, that this was no more a place for innocent youth than that other had been.

  He looked round, studying the hall’s single painting of Christ healing the sick, and, in a niche which was surely designed to hold a classical marble statue, a painted plaster saint. A slight disturbance of the air, a faint rustling like dry leaves, made him turn.

  A fully-fledged nun this time, her ageless face a painting by Rembrandt, descended the last few stairs and came to stand before him. The starched white coif and wimple reflected light into her face and eyes, and, feeling the impact of her serenity, he stared in frank appraisal. Unlike the girl, she met his gaze quite openly, although she did not offer him her hand. The voice was unmistakably that of a well-bred Englishwoman. In his surprise, he heard only half of what was obviously a standard speech about the work of this obscure little order of nursing nuns; as she repeated her offer to escort him on a tour of the house, he declined rather abruptly. With a smile of apology, Robert explained that his sister had described its facilities in excellent detail, and, much to his regret, his state of convalescence did not allow for a protracted visit. If it was convenient, he simply wished to see Mrs Charlotte Duncannon.

  Wasting no words, and like the mistress of the house she undoubtedly was, Sister Cuthbert simply turned and bade him follow her. She led him through glass doors into a beautiful conservatory, flourishing like a small jungle with exotic plants and shrubs. Beneath tree-sized palms, several ladies sat at small tables; except for the two nuns reading identical black-bound books, the scene could have been the palm court of an expensive seaside hotel. Momentarily nonplussed, Robert ventured a comment on the number of visitors.

  ‘Patients, Captain. The less disturbed ones, of course.’

  With raised eyebrows, Robert followed the quietly rustling figure down a long corridor. Molloy, he reflected, had always claimed his colleague Stevens to be brilliant, and one of a new school of thought where the treatment of insanity was concerned. Letty, surprisingly, had extolled the nuns’ every virtue, but still Robert could not quite believe it.

  ‘And the others?’ he asked.

  ‘Each case is treated individually,’ she replied. ‘Your wife, as I am sure you are aware, was exceedingly disturbed when she came to us. But with care and patience, and under the guidance of Dr Stevens, we have managed to gain Charlotte’s confidence. She has periods of quite rational calm, you know, and as time goes by, we hope to extend those periods.’

  ‘You hope for a cure?’

  The nun shook her head. ‘I’m sure you realize the unlikelihood of that, Captain. But by kindness and God’s good grace, we can help her to be less unhappy.’

  The faith she wore like a cloak was touching Robert, and he resented it, even suspected a hint of accusation behind her words. On a reflex he bridled and said defensively: ‘My profession takes me away a good deal. Of necessity I had to leave Charlotte in the care of others.’

  ‘Life is hard enough,’ she said, appearing not to notice the guilty colour which flooded his cheeks, ‘without any of us making judgements. Only God may do that.’

  She halted before a closed door, and Robert’s apprehension rose like bile. He had not seen Charlotte in almost two years, and his last sight of her, cowering like a terrified, hunted animal, had shocked him to the core. One look had been enough to convince him that she was totally beyond the help of any half-trained nurse. But there had been no time to do more than leave joint power of attorney with William and Letty; he had had to abandon all arrangements to them.

  ‘Charlotte enjoys painting,’ Sister Cuthbert said. ‘Did you know that?’

  He was astounded. Even more so when she opened the door on a studio ranged round with easels, the walls covered with the strangest works of art he had ever seen. Some were no more than childish daubs; others, well-executed, were disturbing in both content and perspective; a few bore the marks of vibrant, clashing colour; one was simply black.

  ‘Sister Matthew is our inspiration here — I must introduce you to her. She’s a most talented artist and a wonderful teacher. There she is with Charlotte.’

  For a second, it seemed his heart skipped a beat; his eyes searched the far row of easels and spotted an incongruously smocked nun, her charge painting furiously in grim and silent concentration. His eyes flicked over that small, intent figure, then returned. Charlotte was so radically changed, so unmatched to any of his memories that he hardly recognized her. Although he knew she could not be much past thirty, she looked much older, with the spinster spareness of middle age. Her hair, once so long and lustrous, was pulled severely back from her forehead in a single short braid, steely rather than silvery in that cold northern light. Like her mouth, her face seemed pinched and thin, totally devoid of what little colour she had once possessed; yet there was a lively intensity of movement in hands and eyes, a truly miraculous transformation when he recalled his last sight of her at White Leigh.

  That terrified and terrifying creature had gone, but with illness and the passing years her beauty had also faded. He found it hard to believe that this ordinary-looking woman had once captivated and appalled him, even driven him to the brink of desperation. It did not seem possible. A few short paces separated them, yet he might have been invisible, so absorbed was she. Relief washed over him, and then subsided, leaving him drained of any emotion. It was strange to think this woman was, in the eyes of Church and State, his wife. He supposed there had been too much water under the bridge of his life, a veritable flood of events which had shifted the wreck of his marriage to a point of minimal importance. Only in very low moments did he acknowledge its existence; and when Sister Cuthbert referred to his wife, Robert immediately pictured Louisa, who had been, and always would be, the wife he had truly wanted. Sadness washed over him then, and a familiar resentment; without Charlotte, he could have married Louisa and made her happy.

  Sister Cuthbert attracted the nun’s attention and she nodded, signifying with a motion of her hand that she would speak to them shortly. For a moment Robert was tempted to look at what Charlotte was painting, then changed his mind; if the work expressed her thoughts and feelings, it was better not to look too closely. He shivered, wincing as his shoulder made itself known again, and made a slow retreat to the door.

  Satisfied by his visit, and utterly exhausted, Robert declined the offer of tea, and returned to his carriage. The journey, the gamut of emotions, had been too much. Letty, as usual, was right: he should have waited a little longer. But when death stood near to claiming him, he had made certain promises, promises that must be fulfilled as soon as possible. Before life became mundane again; before he forgot the simple euphoria of survival.

  The journey to Charlotte was shortest and first; but later there were other journeys to make, longer and infinitely more difficult to face.

  ‘I trust you had a pleasant drive, sir?’ McMahon murmured as he arrived home. ‘Miss Letty is hearing Miss Georgina in the drawing room.’

  Thanking him, Robert followed the rousing notes of a faultlessly played mazurka, feeling his spirits lift as he crept quietly into the room where his sister and daughter were seated together at the piano. Letty’s iron-grey hair was as carelessly pinned as ever, wayward strands falling forward as she turned each page of music; and Georgina had grown so much in two years that it amazed him still to see her blonde head on a level
with her aunt’s shoulder. She was thin like Letty, all arms and legs like a young foal; but her face had character already. She would never possess her mother’s vapid beauty, and for that Robert was profoundly grateful.

  Unexpectedly, and in spite of everything, their presence was a comfort to him. He had been afraid, once he had taken time to think, that with Charlotte gone from White Leigh, they would return there; but they had stayed in Dublin and he was grateful. Without them, without Louisa, this house would have become again what it had been once before: empty, forlorn and soulless. He still had a home, if not Louisa, but she had left part of herself here in memories which would never fade.

  After two years away he could not understand the sense of bereavement which had come with his return; it was as though Louisa had left only the week before, and those long months abroad were no more than the stuff of fantasy. He could not escape the feeling that she should have been here; that if he closed his eyes and opened them quickly, she would appear, her eyes alight with laughter at the practical joke.

  After an early dinner, physically and mentally exhausted by the day, Robert made his excuses and went upstairs. Before ringing for McMahon to help him undress, he went through into Louisa’s old room, lit the bedside lamp and slowly scanned the room. Little had changed. The decor of deep rose and cream still gave an illusion of warmth and femininity, the pictures she had chosen echoing her love of birds and flowers and wide open spaces.

  The window reflected his fragmented image; but for a moment he stood looking beyond it, remembering the garden below in the height of summer, as she had first seen it, with rose arbours in full bloom, close-clipped lawns, and heliotrope in flower along that south-facing wall. With a sigh he pulled the curtains together, and turning to her dressing-table, ran gentle fingers over china and cut crystal, pretty scent bottles he must have bought for her once upon a time. In one of the drawers were a few lace-edged handkerchiefs embroidered with her initials, and a lavender sachet whose redolence did not disappoint him. Even on another woman that old, traditional scent could always conjure her, rosy-cheeked as a country-girl, with her bare arms and flapping sunbonnet, striding across those broad Lincolnshire meadows.

  He sank down on the bed and lit a cigar, wondering why it was he should picture her like that, when that was no more than one day in five long years. Perhaps it was the sexual memory, he thought, so deep it seemed physically implanted, so rich it could rouse him even now. He considered it and found the idea both more and less than what he sought; connected, but not the answer itself. Instinctively, he felt it had something to do with the person she was, with his very first impression in the depths of a city winter, of sun and open skies, and a warm generosity of spirit oddly at variance with time or place.

  But that was not the woman who had lived here, not the woman who had refused to listen, refused to forgive, who had taken herself and his children away from here, and never a word since.

  Why had she changed so? he asked himself; and in the next instant, with sudden insight, he wondered whether she had really changed at all, whether in fact he had tried too hard to mould her into something she could never be. He had wanted her to be his wife, and in his mind he had had an image of the two of them gracing various social functions: Louisa, elegant, witty and beautiful, and himself outrageously envied for the lovely woman on his arm. But she was not his wife and never could be, and as his mistress there had been too many barriers to cross.

  She had tried, and he could not fault her there; but the children had been their downfall. They had altered every single aspect, in ways and to extents he still found incredible. Fettered by them, her bright, lively, independent spirit had changed almost beyond recognition, and with the wisdom of hindsight Robert saw what folly it had been to imagine he could hold her in such a way. On occasion, that excess of domesticity had been claustrophobic to him; but he had been able to walk away from it. Louisa never could.

  And in walking away from him, she had taken the children with her, shouldering that responsibility alone.

  He had never seriously believed she would go. The farce with Amelia Loy had never been much more than that in his mind; it was so lacking in any real substance, he could not believe Louisa would take it so much to heart. But she had, and in this very room he had found her, packing with methodical calm, for all practical purposes deaf, dumb and blind to his plans and entreaties.

  Thrusting aside what happened after that, Robert stood up and paced the room, stubbing out the remains of his cigar in the empty fireplace. He looked in the wardrobe, knowing all her fine gowns would still be there. She had taken so few personal things with her. Only two days ago he had discovered that of all her jewellery Louisa had taken but one item with her: the diamond and sapphire brooch he had bought for her in York.

  The scent of lavender caught him afresh; he stood with head bowed and eyes closed, regretting the blind folly which had spurred him on, the angry pride which so hated to be crossed. And if the drink that night had lent a little Dutch courage, it had certainly dulled the edge of his perceptions, so that he reached for her in the only way he knew, firm in his belief that he could stop her leaving, and in the aftermath of love convince her of his good intent. But it had not turned out that way, and when he woke, many hours later, she was already gone.

  He had known then, with absolute certainty, that she would not be back. Known also, in the darker recesses of his mind, that what he had done the night before was unpardonable. He could forgive himself for Amelia Loy, but he could not forgive the rest.

  Letty had taken her and the children to Kingstown, seen them safely aboard the steam packet; and then returned to berate him. Blistered pride made him cover rage and pain with cold, detached calm, while he went through the motions of sending telegrams to York, requesting confirmation of the children’s safe arrival. Except as a matter of life and death, however, Robert could not have followed, nor even set pen to paper as a means of reparation. He was crippled by his own folly; even told himself it was for the best.

  His sister raged; Georgina verged on hysteria, begging him to go and bring Louisa and the children back. When he refused, they both accused him in their own ways of a cruelty and callousness he almost wished were fact. Clinging to the last vestiges of self-control, he returned to Dundalk to set other plans in motion.

  Within three weeks of Louisa’s departure for York, Robert was on his way to Cairo. It was ironic, he thought, how tempted he had been during the whole of that spring and summer of ‘ninety-six. With Kitchener’s campaign going so well, he had longed to be out there amongst the action; and yet for Louisa and the children he had stayed. Had he ignored those responsibilities, there would have been no Amelia Loy; and Louisa would probably have accepted the situation and stayed in Dublin with Letty and Georgina.

  There was, in fact, such a thread of irony running through the whole of his experience out there that the memory of it brought the ghost of a smile to Robert’s lips. The model they worked from might have been the Indian Army, but the reality was somewhat different. It was hard, unremitting work; rewarding, but not without its moments of frustration and despair. In less than two years, Robert knew he had learned more about soldiering than in an entire career spent at home. In the Sudanese campaign especially, those months in the desert with Haig and Broadwood and Kitchener taught him more about human nature than even he had previously suspected.

  Uncomfortably close to the idea of dying, it seemed life was stripped to essentials, that all obscuring trivia fell away, revealing people and situations for what they really were. He saw that guilt and resentment were unnecessary burdens, akin to the chairs and bedsteads some officers insisted on lugging everywhere; and selfishness a petty luxury, windy and tasteless as inferior champagne. Certainly he had learned much about himself, and, with regard to his most personal and intimate relationships, was not overly impressed. Whether he could change very much was another matter, but he desperately wanted Louisa to know what he had discovered. And
he wanted… But no, he must not think of that, not now.

  Drastic changes might not come about — he was prepared to accept that – but with regard to his career they could well be forcibly imposed. As things stood, he was a man with a most uncertain future. If his arm and shoulder healed well enough to leave no permanent disability, all well and good... If not, then he would be permanently retired at the age of thirty-seven.

  Oppressed by the thought, and in considerable physical pain, he closed the door on Louisa’s gowns and wished it were possible to lock away the past with the same finality. With a heavy sigh he rang the bell for McMahon.

  Two

  He woke, sweating, having dreamed again of that carnage at Omdurman. Wave upon wave of horsemen, charging straight into the teeth of the British guns; then the Dervishes on foot, beings possessed, masses rushing heedlessly on, regardless of that hail of bullets. Twenty minutes which seemed as many hours, twenty agonizing minutes when it seemed McDonald’s infantry must break under the onslaught... and then, mercifully, the order for cavalry squadrons to attack; the fierce joy of the charge, pride in his own men’s response, absolute conviction of success...

  But the Dervishes did not turn and flee. They fought where they stood, viciously, like tigers. All except one; one who knelt and begged for mercy...

  Shivering, Robert pulled on his robe and reached for his cigars. Opening the window, he stood and looked down into the Square, trying to banish the memory of that cringing face, and knowing it would be with him till his dying day.

  Despite the heat of battle, despite the dozens upon dozens he had cut down with savage pleasure, that pathetic, crouching figure had momentarily halted his sword; and as he swept on past, the hidden scimitar swirled and caught him. He remembered the scream as the betrayer was cut down by one of his own men, but recalled little else, had no idea how he kept his saddle, how he had avoided being killed in the rain of cross-fire.