The Linden Tree

by Hester Rowan

  Of course. As I sat looking at the photograph my free hand was instinctively moving over my face, as though I was looking at myself in a backstage make-up mirror. The features of the girl in the photograph were almost the same as my own.

  I turned quickly to Nicolas. ‘Who is she?’

  ‘Her name’s Elisabeth. You’re not by any means identical – there are differences in the shape of the ears and the colour of the eyes, and she’s probably an inch or two taller and heavier as well. But superficially there’s a strong resemblance. If you wore your hair in the same way, and her clothes, you could easily pass for her.’

  I knew with a sudden sick certainty what was coming next, but I had to have it put into words.

  ‘And that’s what you’re asking me to do?’

  Nicolas was watching me steadily, unsmilingly. ‘Yes. For a short period – about twenty-four hours – I want you to change places with Elisabeth.’

  Chapter Four

  There was a long pause. I pushed my tea aside. Tabitha stretched, yawned and settled in her basket, exhausted after an hour of wakefulness.

  Eventually I spoke. ‘Why?’ I asked bluntly.

  ‘I wish I could tell you the whole story,’ Nicolas said, putting down his empty cup, ‘but unfortunately I’m not free to do so. It’s complicated and confidential. I’ll be able to tell you more when you’ve agreed to help, but briefly the situation is this: Elisabeth has an aged grandmother living some distance from her, who is critically ill. For reasons which you’ll understand later, it’s very difficult for Elisabeth to visit her grandmother. As things are, she’ll only be able to make two separate half-hour visits on successive days at the end of this week. But if you’ll agree to change places with her, she can extend her visit for twenty-four hours.’

  ‘You mean … you want me to cover her absence? To give her an alibi?’

  He shrugged. ‘Yes, if you want to put it like that. An alibi isn’t necessarily criminal, you know.’

  It sounded preposterous. ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake – how could I possibly get away with it? However much we may be alike, everyone who knows her would spot the deception at once.’

  ‘No problem. Her family are all in favour of the arrangement. And as I said, her grandmother lives some distance away, so Elisabeth has to take a few days’ holiday to make the visit. She’ll be completely unknown, in the city where her grandmother lives, except vaguely by sight to one or two people. That’s why it’ll be perfectly easy for you to walk out of her grandmother’s house pretending to be Elisabeth, while she stays put. After that, you’re simply a girl on holiday in a strange city until the following day, when you return to the house and resume your own identity. It won’t be difficult at all.’

  ‘But if Elisabeth is on holiday, why can’t she visit her grandmother in the normal way? Why go through this performance?’

  Nicolas frowned impatiently. ‘I told you, there are complications. I can’t explain at the moment but you’ll understand, I promise you, when the time comes.’

  I shook my head. ‘No. Sorry, but you’ll have to count me out.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Why! Good grief, Nicolas, you didn’t seriously expect me to agree to take part in this mad scheme, did you? It doesn’t make sense – it sounds unpleasantly crooked, if you want to know.’

  ‘Crooked?’ His eyes widened; he looked genuinely offended. ‘It’s nothing of the sort, I assure you. I agree that it might sound odd if it came from a stranger, but you know me well enough to know that I’m not dishonest.’

  The opening that he offered was too good not to take. I returned his own words, on ice. ‘Ah, but I don’t, do I? I know what you look like, you see, and I know your family background – but as for your character, I know nothing about that at all. Frankly, all I’ve learned about you this afternoon is that you make an excellent con-man.’

  He glowered. ‘It was an act, and I’ve already explained and apologized for it. If it comes to that, you’re an actress too – that’s one of the added reasons why you’re ideal for changing places with Elisabeth, because you’re used to playing a part. But it seems that I misjudged your character. I thought that I’d discovered this afternoon that you’re a compassionate person, but now I find that you’re not. You’re a professional, obviously. You’re not humanitarian enough to use your ability to help another girl, your interest in acting is only for the money.’

  I stood up, furious. ‘Now wait a minute –’

  ‘No, you wait a minute!’ he snapped. ‘Here’s a girl who urgently needs help, and you are in fact the only person in the world who can give it to her. And here you are with time on your hands, but you’re not prepared to give up even twenty-four hours of it so that she can spend a little more time with her dying grandmother …’

  We had been glaring at each other across the kitchen, but now I wavered under the impact of his scorn. ‘That’s all very well,’ I protested weakly, ‘but don’t you see how peculiar – how unlikely it all sounds?’

  He softened fractionally. ‘Not to me it doesn’t; but then, I know the details. Once you know them, you’ll be as anxious to help as I am.’

  ‘How do you come into this?’ I asked. ‘Is Elisabeth your girl-friend?’

  ‘No, I’ve never met her. She’s the daughter of a man I once met, and he’s a friend of friends.’

  I turned away and wandered uneasily out into the garden, thinking hard. The afternoon was still beautiful, but I hardly noticed my surroundings. Nicolas’s words had stung me; I felt mean, as he intended I should.

  I was sorry for Elisabeth, whoever she was … But it was no use, I couldn’t get involved in her problems, I had problems enough of my own.

  Nicolas had followed me out into the sunlight, and I rounded on him.

  ‘It’s not as easy for me as you seem to think,’ I said bitterly. ‘Your crack about acting for money just shows how little you know about the profession. I’m out of work, in debt, and about to be in terrible trouble with my aunt when she gets home. I’m sorry for Elisabeth, but I can’t afford to go gadding off to help her. If you must know, I’m working as a temporary waitress at the Regent Hotel. I’m due back there at six and I’ll be late if I don’t start getting ready, so if you’ll excuse me –’

  He reproved me, but mildly. ‘There’s no need to sound so defensive about it, Alison. I know what you’re doing – I didn’t mean to imply that you’re being idle. I’m afraid I didn’t make it clear that you will, of course, have your expenses paid if you agree to help.’

  ‘I shouldn’t get far without,’ I commented ungraciously.

  ‘Generous expenses,’ he went on, strolling past me to the garage and opening the back door. ‘In fact Elisabeth’s friends have told me to use my discretion, and I’m sure we can stretch the expenses to cover most of your problems.’ He switched on the garage light, edged past the messy paint pots piled on the work-bench and bent to inspect the front off-side wing of my aunt’s car. ‘Ouch, that’s nasty.’

  ‘Don’t you dare say anything against women drivers,’ I advised him. ‘How did you know about it, anyway?’

  ‘Oh, Mrs Thorpe who lives just across the road saw it happen.’

  ‘She would,’ I said vindictively.

  He straightened and looked at me with reproach, making the most of his ability to reduce me to the size of a worm. ‘Mrs Thorpe is a very old lady who is housebound – looking out of the window is one of her few remaining pleasures. My mother knows her, so when I saw the damage to your front gates I called in to see her. You’d provided the big excitement of her week, so she was eager to tell me all about it. She was very complimentary about the way you managed to avoid hitting the dog – I shouldn’t be at all surprised if she puts your name forward for some kind of animal lovers’ medal.’

  ‘Aunt Madge would be pleased,’ I said.

  Nicolas grinned. ‘Yes, well, at least we can avert some of her wrath. As it happens, the local Renault dealer is an uncle of mine; I expec
t your aunt bought the car from him in the first place. I’m sure I can persuade him to do a rush job and get it fixed before she comes home. And I know a local builder who’ll mend the gates too – we’ll get the whole lot done on your expenses. All right?’

  ‘But I haven’t agreed to help yet,’ I protested, backing into the garden. The prospect of having the worst of my financial problems solved was a temptation difficult to resist, but I refused to be rushed. ‘Look, you’re sure there’s nothing crooked about this business with Elisabeth?’

  ‘It’s not even slightly bent, I promise.’

  I took a deep breath. ‘All right then, I’ll think it over tonight and let you know tomorrow.’

  He looked at his watch. ‘Sorry, Alison. There’s a deadline, I’m afraid. You have to decide here and now.’

  ‘But that’s impossible!’ I protested, instinctively digging in my heels. ‘I can’t leave just like that! There’s my job at the hotel … the cat … I’ve got to mow the lawn …’

  He laughed, turned the key in the lock of the garage door and pocketed it. ‘Stop making excuses. I’ll give you just ten minutes to pack a bag, enough for three days, and while you’re doing it I’ll ring the hotel and say you’ve been suddenly called away – I’m sure they’ll survive without your assistance. Then we’ll go straight to my home. You’d better stay overnight because we’ll have to make a very early start tomorrow. Bring the keys of the Renault and I’ll ask my father to organize the work on the car and the gates. Oh, and my young sister Belinda’s home from Art School, so she can come over while you’re away to feed the cat and mow the lawn. All right now?’

  The authority in his voice was unmistakable, and I resented it.

  ‘No, it’s not all right!’ I said indignantly. ‘I refuse to be hustled like this. I’ve got to think it over.’

  If I had expected him to become patient and persuasive, I was disappointed. He shrugged. ‘That’s it, then,’ he said curtly. ‘I can’t waste any more time. If you’re not prepared to come now, it’s all off.’ He looked his contempt and began to walk away.

  My troubles, which had been rapidly receding, suddenly turned and came crowding back; I had told Nicolas that I couldn’t afford to help Elisabeth, but now I knew I couldn’t afford not to.

  ‘Wait,’ I called. ‘I’ll come! Just give me a quarter of an hour –’

  He turned back. ‘Ten minutes was all I offered,’ he said sternly, but the look of relief on his face was so genuine that I made it in twelve.

  When we reached the farm, his mother came to the door at the sound of the car. She was still attractive but shorter than I remembered, greying, more comfortably rounded.

  ‘You remember Alison, Mother?’

  ‘Yes, of course. I’m so glad to see you again – it’s been a long time.’

  ‘It’s lovely to be here again,’ I said, glancing at the familiar surroundings. ‘But I really am sorry to turn up like this without any warning.’

  Mrs Allen looked hospitably puzzled. ‘Oh, we knew you were coming, my dear. Nicolas told us that he’d be bringing you to stay the night.’

  Her son gave me a bland smile as he carried my bag into the house. There were several things I’d have liked to tell his mother about him, but as none of them were complimentary I kept them to myself.

  I had assumed, now that I had agreed to help Elisabeth, that Nicolas would tell me the whole story, but there never seemed to be an opportunity. The Allen household was noisily extrovert. Belinda had an Art School friend staying with her, and young local cousins and friends arrived early in the evening to play scratch tennis on the bumpy back lawn.

  After he had introduced me, Nicolas disappeared with his father to discuss some new farm buildings. Father and son were distinctly alike: Simon had obviously acquired his dark looks from his mother, but Nicolas had his father’s features and build. There were, though, clear family resemblances between the brothers. Now that he was on home ground, Nicolas reminded me strongly of Simon in a dozen different gestures, tricks of speech …

  But Nicolas was a different man. Simon, as I remembered him, had had a dash of swank about him: Simon had known he was handsome, had taken it for granted that every girl he met would be weakened by his charm, and had accordingly treated his girl-friends with a patronage that, at the time, I had mistaken for chivalry. At tennis, Simon had always delivered deliberate pat-ball services to girls.

  Nicolas though, teased by Belinda’s friend into playing tennis with her, offered no concessions. I watched as they played one brief set. He was clearly out of practice and inaccurate, but his powerful service slaughtered her. And afterwards he offered her no apology, but merely smiled and thanked her for the game.

  I declined, very firmly, to play tennis with him. Instead, I foolishly allowed his quiet, kindly, pipe-smoking father to introduce me to and annihilate me in a particularly vicious form of croquet.

  Supper was a movable feast, a cold buffet eaten either in the farmhouse kitchen or out in the half-tamed garden, and when it was too dark to stay outside we retreated to the dining-room to play Monopoly round the big table. It was all I could do to catch Belinda’s attention for a few minutes to ask her to look after my aunt’s cat while I was away; but it appeared that she knew all about it already.

  Hospitable as the Allens were, their gamesmanship was ruthless. I was saved from an ignominiously early bankruptcy at Monopoly only by Nicolas’s announcement that we ought to get some sleep.

  ‘I want to leave here by five-thirty,’ he announced. ‘I’ll lend you an alarm clock, Alison – and mind you’re down by five-fifteen, or I’ll come and haul you out of bed.’

  Belinda looked up from the paper fortune she had amassed at my expense. ‘He would, too,’ she laughed. ‘He’s a hard man, my brother. Don’t let those long eyelashes of his fool you, Alison – if you’re going anywhere with him, he’ll expect it to be on his terms.’

  ‘Will he?’ I said demurely. I hoped that they would all think that I had good reason to disbelieve her, but already I knew only too well that Belinda was right.

  Nicolas patted her dark curly hair as he passed her chair. ‘Sweet child. We must remember to bring you a stick of seaside rock.’

  Mrs Allen rattled the dice vigorously. For all her placid appearance, she had a shrewd eye for business: having cornered the top slice of the real estate market, she was now intent on putting up enough property to enable her to demand exorbitant rents from hapless callers.

  ‘You won’t mind if I don’t get up in the morning to see you off, Alison?’ she said. ‘Now that my husband has sold the dairy herd, it’s such a luxury for us to be able to lie in a little. I do think it’s sensible of you to make an early start. It’s such a long way to Cornwall and the traffic is bound to be bad later. Do have a lovely holiday, both of you.’

  I glanced at Nicolas. It was understandable that he had not told his family anything about Elisabeth – after all, he had explained to me that her problems were confidential. In the circumstances, to put out the story that we were going on holiday was reasonable; I wondered only if his choice of location was significant.

  He met my eyes and smiled briefly, giving nothing away as he said good night.

  I found it very difficult to go to sleep. I opened the dormer window as wide as possible, catching a drift of perfume from the honeysuckle that grew below, but the chintzy room under the eaves with its sloping floor and sloping walls remained oppressively warm. I lay with only a sheet over me, listening first to the muted sounds from below, then to the family coming up to bed, and finally to the small creaking of the old timbers as the farmhouse settled for the night, worrying over the ordeal that lay ahead.

  What stupidity had I let myself in for? Because it was stupid, it must be; I couldn’t possibly envisage a situation in which a girl of my age, given a holiday from work and the necessary finance – and the finance must be available, otherwise my expenses couldn’t be met so casually – would be unable to visit her grandm
other!

  And yet … whatever else Nicolas might be, he certainly wasn’t stupid. There had to be some other, more important reason for the exchange of identity, or Nicolas would not be concerned. So was this exchange merely a cover for something else? What, then? Was there really to be an exchange, or was Nicolas conning me again?

  What a fool I’d been, ever to think of letting myself be involved!

  Well, there was one very simple way out. I could get up, now, dress, pack, creep downstairs, leave a note for Nicolas to say that I’d changed my mind, and let myself out of the back door. It was only a couple of miles to my aunt’s house. I could walk it in no time and be safely back in her spare bed soon after midnight.

  There would still be all my old problems, it was true … But I could beat them somehow. I’d hitch a lift back home to Leicester, explain about my aunt’s car, borrow the money from my father to clear all my debts and then knuckle down to an honest job so that I could repay him. Any plain and straightforward work would be preferable to being caught up any further in this extraordinary situation that Nicolas had tried to talk me into.

  I’d be letting Elisabeth down of course … but was there really a sick grandmother? Honestly, I’d never heard such an improbable story in my life!

  But if it were true, and I let her down, Nicolas would despise me.

  What of it if he did? Nicolas was nothing to me, it just happened that I liked his family. His brother Simon had been the first love of my life, but I was now an adult – and if Simon meant nothing to me there was no reason why I should care what Nicolas thought about me. If I left the house now, I should probably never see Nicolas again in the whole of my life.

  And that, I acknowledged wryly as I checked that the travelling alarm he had lent me was set for five in the morning, was the last thing I wanted to happen.

  Chapter Five

  I crept downstairs next morning with a minute to spare, and found Nicolas in the kitchen brewing one of his pots of paralysingly strong tea. I’m not at my best in the early morning and neither it seemed was he; we avoided each other’s eyes, and after a muttered ‘’Morning,’ he pushed a cup of tea across the table to me in silence before picking up my bag and taking it out to his car.