Up the bluff ... across the Bay, which looked very much like any other street, except that the river-side was open on to the wide stretch of bluff, planted here and there with trees, unrecognisable in the fast-fading light. She had forgotten the name of the street they were on now. Panic seized her. But what did it matter? They were crossing another wide one. Broughton Street, of course. ‘Not many people about on Broughton,’ she said. For her own benefit? Anne’s? Jem’s?
The house in Oglethorpe Square was larger than she had expected. Flares burned, welcomingly, at either side of the double steps with the handsome ironwork that one of William Jay’s friends had provided. His name eluded her and again panic threatened, to be fought off, again, with common sense. What on earth did it matter?
The carriage had been expected. At the top of the steps, double doors were thrown open revealing a brilliantly lighted interior. Jem helped her down. She took one quick, breathless look around the darkening square: trees of some kind, lights across the way — of course, Mrs. Richardson’s house. ‘Thank you, Jem.’ She lifted delicate muslin skirts and climbed the steps as if she had done it every day for months.
Servants were drawn up on either side of the broad entrance hall, white teeth enthusiastically agleam in black faces. She must remember that she, Josephine, had been down at Winchelsea for two weeks. ‘No help for it,’ Josephine had said, ‘they’re all bound to be there to greet you. You will just have to make the best you can of it. Remember as many names as possible —’ Remember? She could remember nothing, an actress who had walked on to the wrong scene of an unknown play. She stood there for an endless moment, gazing past the welcoming row of faces to the stairway that curved up on each side of the far end of the hall to an elegant, balustraded gallery. Once there, she would be safe. Hyde would be out, Josephine had told her: ‘It’s his night for the Club. He never misses when he’s in Savannah.’ So — up those stairs, down the hall, up another flight, and sanctuary: her own rooms. But first she must run this friendly gauntlet. She took a deep breath and turned to the huge woman who stood to the right of the door, her richly coloured turban proclaiming her status as house-keeper. ‘Venus!’ She said. ‘I’m glad to see you. How are the children?’
‘They’s rumbustious, thanking you, missus. I never saw such a pack of blessed devils in my life! Well, what d’you expect, with Satan for a father?’
It was an old, reliable joke, which had irritated Josephine almost, she said, past bearing. Juliet found it oddly touching.
‘I’m glad.’ She turned to the butler, who was standing on the other side of the door, resplendent in formal black and a brilliant scarlet neck-handkerchief. ‘And you, Moses?’
‘All the better for seeing you home, ma’am. We’ve missed you sorely all those long days you’ve been at Winchelsea. Home don’t seem home without the mistress.’
‘Thank you.’ It was more, she rather suspected, than Josephine deserved. Her heart sank as she looked down the line of smiling men on one side and women on the other. It was impossible. It had to be done. A girl’s face, close to Venus, swam out of the mist that was blurring her eyes. Lighter than the others, beautiful, with huge dark eyes. ‘She fancies herself a beauty,’ Josephine had said. Juliet took a deep breath. ‘Alice, I’m exhausted. Take me up!’ A wan smile for the rest of them. ‘Thank you all. Tomorrow ….’
It was over, they were dispersing with sympathetic murmurs, while Alice (thank God it was Alice) had come swiftly forward to relieve her of bonnet and gloves. ‘I could see from the first you were tired, madam.’ Her English was as beautiful as her face. ‘It’s a long pull back from Winchelsea, even in this weather. Mr. Purchis will be sorry to see you so tuckered out.’ Was there a warning in her voice and in the glance that she directed upwards to the balustraded gallery at the end of the hall? Following it, ‘Oh,’ said Juliet.
Had he been there all the time? She would never be sure. Now he advanced into the light of the central chandelier and leaned his elbows on the marble balustrade to look down at her. Their eyes met: his cool, grey; hers suddenly aswim with tears. Josephine had told her nothing. What had she said? ‘Everyone adores him.’ Adore. Ridiculous word. Handsome? Well, of course. Soft brown hair brushed carelessly back from the high forehead. ‘He won’t wear side-whiskers.’ Josephine’s voice, a mocking echo. ‘He should have married a talking dictionary.’ Why had Josephine never told her? This was not an American as she had learned to know them in the gambling hells of New Orleans. This, she gave a little gulp, as if she found breathing difficult, this —
She paused, even thought suspended, as he spoke. ‘Welcome home, my love. I’m sorry to hear the journey has fatigued you. I had hoped you would be able to give Mr. Jay the meeting. He sups with me tonight, to talk plans for next week.’ He started elegant, leisurely, down the curving stair towards her.
‘Oh!’ said Juliet again, and then, gathering her wits about her. ‘La, my dear, what a delightful surprise. I had quite thought you would be at the Club tonight.’
‘And so I would, but for your happy return.’ He was advancing on her, now, across the polished wood floor of the hall and she found her frantic thoughts fix themselves on the vast width of the planks. At last, reluctant, terrified (but why?) she raised her dark eyes to meet his grey ones. ‘Welcome, my dear.’ You could hardly call it a kiss, that butterfly touch of his, yet it left her shaken as by an earthquake.
‘Madame is worn out.’ Anne bustled forward to interrupt a silence that seemed as if it would last forever. ‘Let us but get her upstairs, sir, Alice and I, and an hour’s rest will have her right as a trivet for Mr. Jay.’
‘A trivet?’ There was laughter in the deep voice now. ‘My dear Anne,’ he lapsed into unexpectedly fluent French, ‘where in the world have you been studying English?’
‘Get along with you, sir.’ Anne spoke with the comfortable licence of an invaluable servant and companion. ‘My English is no worse than your French, I’ll be bound. And what time do you expect Mr. Jay, if I may ask? We hardly expected company, the night we got home, the mistress and I.’
‘And no more did I.’ To Juliet’s shaken relief, he had moved a little away from her, but still kept those penetrating grey eyes fixed on her face. ‘To tell truth, Anne, I met Mr. Jay at the Exchange this morning, and he invited himself. There’s no time to be lost, he says, if the plans for his grand opening party are not all to go awry. So — if you can bring yourself to join us — presently — my dear, it will make him a happy man as well as me.’
‘Yes, yes of course. An hour, half an hour, I don’t know.’ She was babbling, and could not help it. It was Alice, now, who came to the rescue with a strong young arm around her waist. ‘The mistress is tired out, sir.’
‘I’m sorry.’ It was formal now. ‘But let me help you up the stairs.’
‘No!’ If he touched her again, anything might happen. ‘No, thank you.’ With an effort she had the light note again. ‘Anne and Alice are quite assistance enough for one able bodied young woman. Give my apologies to Mr. Jay, when he arrives, and tell him I will join you as soon as I have recovered from my journey.’ She managed a laugh. ‘That great journey from Winchelsea! But it’s true, somehow, today it has been more tiring than usual.’
‘You left all well there, I hope.’
‘Oh, yes.’ Now she was back within her brief. ‘Mr. Updyke asked me to tell you that the cotton’s all in, and the best crop for years.’
‘Good. And old Naomi?’
Naomi. Naomi? NAOMI? She felt Anne stir restlessly behind her, then take the plunge to save her. ‘I visited her this morning, sir. She’s as well as you can expect, at a hundred odd. She was asking for news of Satan and the others. Come, love.’ Her arm was firm under Juliet’s. ‘You must rest.’ And then, back over her shoulder to Hyde, as the three of them started to climb the shelving stairway. ‘You know how tiring it is leaving Winchelsea.’
‘Yes indeed. I hope you told them we’d be there for Christmas, my love.’
Christmas? She and Josephine had never discussed it. ‘A whole month off?’ Her tone was more brittle than she liked. ‘La, my dear, you don’t expect me to plan that far, do you?’
Please God, by Christmas Josephine would be back, this impossible charade over, and for good.
Chapter Three
Josephine’s room was furnished luxuriously in imported chintz, and Juliet, settling on to a chaise longue with a sigh of relief only wished she could stay there all evening. But Anne was abandoning her. ‘If you’ll excuse me, madame, I must set about my unpacking.’ Obviously this was routine, and not to be departed from, but it was a bad moment just the same.
‘Yes, of course, Anne.’ Two of the menservants had already brought up a couple of huge imperials that contained the necessities Josephine took with her between Winchelsea and Savannah, and Alice was hard at work unpacking them, with many a sotto voce mutter at the state of silks and muslins.
Normally, Juliet remembered, Alice would have accompanied her mistress to Winchelsea. Josephine had left her behind this time to make the switch of identities easier. ‘I missed you, Alice.’ She smiled at the girl.
‘I should just about say you did, from the state your things are in. That Poor Kate down at Winchelsea has about as much sense as a turkey buzzard. And her hands always dirty too.’ She held up a white muslin dress marred by two great black smudges. ‘Look!’
‘Take them away, Alice!’ Juliet had no need to make her voice sound fretful. ‘Do the best you can with them. I must have half an hour’s sleep or I’ll be yawning in Mr. Jay’s face.’
‘Yes, ma’am.’ A hint of surprise in Alice’s tone? Why should she not yawn in William Jay’s face? ‘I’ll be back in half an hour to dress you,’ the girl went on. ‘The lilac, do you think?’
‘Why not? And mind; no one is to disturb me; no one, I say, until I ring.’
‘Very good, ma’am.’ No wonder if Alice sounded surprised now.
Left alone, Juliet was up from the chaise longue in an instant. She had half an hour to learn this room by heart. Here was the long closet Josephine had described Hyde as having built specially for her. And here, unmistakable, the lilac dress Alice had recommended. And what a mercy she had! Running her eye quickly along the formidable line of gowns, Juliet picked out a cambric day dress that would be suitable for tomorrow morning. But how would Josephine describe it? By its yellow ribbons, probably, and, yes, there on the shelf below were soft little yellow slippers to match. A crowning mercy, Josephine had said, that even their feet were the same size. Juliet’s hands, however, were half a size larger than her cousin’s as she had discovered, with some discomfort, that afternoon.
Her eye lit on the dark green riding-habit Josephine had once worn to visit her, where it hung with three or four others at the far end of the cupboard. Perhaps she wore riding clothes in the morning? Josephine had told her she often went for what she called ‘a blow’ before breakfast. But tomorrow she would be tired and order breakfast in bed. So, no riding-habit. She dismissed that problem from her thoughts and turned to examine the flounced dressing-table.
Jewels! Here was something Josephine had forgotten to tell her about. Alice had unpacked a leather case and put it on the dressing-table, but where in the world was the key? A similar box, in the drawer, was also locked. With shaking hands, she opened the absurd little reticule Josephine had given her. Money, smelling salts, a comb, a lace-trimmed handkerchief, a tiny silver stick containing delicately tinted lip-salve ... No keys. The pocket of the dress Alice had helped her out of? But it was gone. Alice had carried it off, with the rest of the pile, to be washed and pressed. But, surely, she must know her mistress’s habits and would have retrieved the key first?
This began to look like disaster. And then, an odd little memory: Josephine rather reluctantly taking off the tiny gold watch she wore pinned to her dress, and saying, ‘I mustn’t forget —’ And at that moment Anne had come bustling into the room with some last minute problem to do with closing the house on the bluff, and they had never come back to the thing Josephine must not forget. And, face it, where else would one carry the kind of delicate little key that might well open both these jewel boxes but on a chain round one’s neck? She half thought, now, that she could remember Josephine, from time to time, putting a hand to the bodice of her gown; the gesture of someone making sure a precious object is still there?
Oddly enough, Juliet found this first real set-back bracing. There was nothing she could do about it for the moment, and her self-appointed half-hour was almost up. She finished her tour of the room as swiftly as possible. Ranges of drawers, full of scented gloves, all too small, delicate underwear, obviously Paris-made, dozens of lace-trimmed handkerchiefs like the one in her reticule ... What an orgy Hyde Purchis must have had, outfitting his bride. ‘You should have seen me when he found me,’ Josephine had said. Of course, that was three years ago, many of these luxurious trifles must have been bought since, with the money he had made over to her. And there was another thing. Idiot that she was, she had forgotten to ask Josephine about money! The reticule contained only a few dollars. When that was exhausted, how did she set about obtaining more? Had she a bank account somewhere? Oh well, she crossed the room and pulled the bell-rope firmly, she must just hope Anne knew.
Alice was with her so swiftly that she must have been hovering outside. Her first words confirmed this. ‘The trouble I’ve had to keep them away from you, ma’am! And there’s Miss Anne fit to be tied.’ She sounded pleased about it. Jealousy here, and might it be useful?
‘Oh, Anne!’ Idiotic to have exiled her one ally. ‘Yes, I will see her for a moment, before I change.’
‘Yes, ma’am.’ Disapprovingly. ‘Mr. Jay’s been here this ten minutes and more.’ She seemed to expect this to have some effect.
‘Has he? Oh well, he and M…’ she had almost said Mr. Purchis — ‘my husband will have plenty to talk about. Call Anne for me would you, Alice? It’s absurd,’ she plunged into it, ‘but I seem to have mislaid the keys to my jewel boxes.’
‘Your key!’ Singular not plural; she must just hope the girl had not noticed. Her reaction was certainly dramatic enough. ‘You’ve never lost your chain, ma’am? And the locket? Could you have left it at Winchelsea, do you think? Yes, of course I’ll call Miss Anne this instant, though I doubt she won’t know a thing about it.’ And then, with sudden, disconcerting, warm sympathy, ‘Oh, ma’am, I am sorry.’
A locket! Alice had closed the door softly behind her. On the same chain as the key. With a picture? Lockets, after all, usually had pictures. And Josephine had ‘forgotten’ to give it to her. So — a picture of Napoleon? Too much, surely, to hope it was of Hyde Purchis, particularly in the light of that odd sympathy of Alice’s.
But here was Anne, very much on her dignity. Really, or faking it? Was there no end to these deceptions? And, of course, angrily answering herself, there was not, nor would be, till Josephine came back. ‘You’ve lost your chain, ma’am?’ Anne’s voice was formal. ‘Now that is a how-de-do! What in the world will Mr. Purchis say if you appear with no jewels! And where on earth can you have left it? Not at Winchelsea, that I do know, for I remember you locking the jewel box and tucking the chain back into your dress.’ Here was useful information. Thank God, Anne was no fool. ‘I’ll be bound it was when we stopped below Ruffton,’ she went on, ‘to look at that abandoned plantation house. I told you not to walk through the brush, remember, but you would do it. It must have caught on a briar, and pulled. We’ll have to send the men for it tomorrow.’
‘I just hope they can find it.’ Juliet sounded doubtful, as well she might. When would Josephine remember her oversight, and what in the world would she do about it? Nothing, probably. What could she?
The lilac dress cried out for jewellery. But at least its fit was perfect, its low-cut, tight bodice flatteringly good for morale after those months of drab and increasingly shabby travel-wear. She looked from her reflection in the long glass to A
lice, anxiously hovering. ‘A ribbon, perhaps?’
‘I’ve a chain —’ Anne ventured it diffidently from the corner to which she had withdrawn leaving the field clear for Alice to dress her mistress. ‘You remember, madame? The one you gave me last Christmas. It belonged to your aunt, you said. You didn’t like to wear it, now she was dead. If you wouldn’t mind borrowing it back?’
‘The very thing!’ But while she waited for Anne to fetch the chain, sudden anger crimsoned her cheeks. She remembered those chains, gold filigree, so light, so intricately worked that their value, such as it was, lay in workmanship rather than weight of gold. They had bought them, her mother and Josephine’s, one happy day when they had all gone into Paris together, to celebrate Josephine’s twenty-first birthday. Later, parting, in tears, that desolate April of 1815, they had exchanged chains as a remembrance. Her mother’s, which had been her aunt’s, was in the tiny bundle of her own cherished possessions that she had given Anne to keep for her. But how could Josephine have parted with the other one, even to Anne? Or was Anne intending to produce her own, from that very bundle?
No, here she was, with the other one. ‘I know you dislike the length,’ she said, ‘but I always did say that if you would but wind it twice round, it would be quite the thing.’
‘Yes.’ The delicate tracery of gold did in fact soften the naked look of that low neckline. ‘I was crazy to give it to you, Anne. May I be a brute and take it back again? I’ll buy you another in the morning.’ And then, dear God, what shall I use for money?
A tap at the door. ‘Yes?’ Alice opened it to one of the merry, looking little black boys Juliet had seen in the hall.
‘The master says he and Mr. Jay are plumb hungry for their suppers!’ He grinned saucily at Juliet and took an unceremonious leave, propelled, she thought, with some violence by Alice.
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