‘But you’re not most women, Phoebe, are you? You’re a Hawkin, and from what I’ve heard about the Hawkin women, they’re drawn to forceful men. Would you have responded to sweet words and love songs and tales of charity and brave deeds after what happened to you?’
They were still laughing about it when Claudette, Hetty and Tabby joined them, asking to be shown the Hawkynne portrait in the gallery, which the Countess used as an excuse, if she needed one, to show them around the house.
The four guests were intrigued and impressed by the high-sounding useage to which the rooms had once been put, the Queen’s Bedchamber, the Duke’s Dressing Room, the closets and antechambers. But Claudette was most delighted by the doors concealed in the larger rooms that could only be detected by the vertical cuts in the wallpaper, placed there to give the servants access to the service passage. To her mind, this was a perfect way for ghosts to come and go, but since Mama would not appreciate her talking about such matters, she kept her fancies to herself, thinking it a pity that, on the whole, adults were too matter of fact for their own good.
Phoebe’s thoughts, however, were only half on the beautifully restored rooms, the other half mulling over the extraordinary information concerning Ransome’s use of his rooms at Mortlake. It made her realise, more than anything else, how quick she had been to impose on him the irritation she had felt all those years ago when she was first widowed, a natural reaction against her mother’s insistent ways. Then, she had not even bothered to find out what he was like behind the public image, never suspecting that there might be more to him than what most people saw. The problem had not been that he’d had mistresses. So many men did, when they married for wealth and heirs, not for love. But for a man to offer marriage to a woman while in the process of accommodating a mistress a mere couple of miles away was a situation few women would accept without making a fuss about it. And that, she saw it now, had been dear Josephine’s unhelpful contribution, which she herself had been only too ready to believe.
Of course, he had done absolutely nothing to dispel Phoebe’s jaundiced picture of him, especially on his first visit, when he had been considerably less than gentlemanly, as if he’d known for certain that, with a threat to hold over her, he could make her think again. And she had. And now, mistress or no mistress, she had agreed to let him into her life, not so much for his kindness to Leon but because part of her had responded to his dangerous side, as the Countess had suggested, and because she had answered his call to her physical longings, her desires, her needs. Wanting him more than anything, she had agreed in principle to be his wife while using the title of mistress to embarrass the family who had embarrassed her. Hardly the behaviour of a rational woman, but rationality had so far played only a minor role in her feelings for this amazing man. And now she could not help questioning whether she would have accepted him sooner if she’d known about his plans for the Mortlake house, or not. The Countess was a very perceptive woman.
‘And this is known as the Yellow Satin Bedroom,’ she was saying as she led the ladies out of the Queen’s Closet, ‘where the Duchess of Lauderdale had cages of birds all round the window. Such a pretty room. Lovely view across to the river.’ Out and round, they passed through to the gallery, ‘Which was once the dining room over the hall, until the ceiling was knocked through. Much better now. And here is Sir Leo and Lady Phoebe. Your ancestors, Miss Claudette. Is she not very like your mama?’
Again, Phoebe experienced the same prickling sensation of kinship that had taken her so much by surprise, this time no less surreal than the first. Drawn to forceful men, the Countess had told her, so perhaps these two had had their ups and downs, like her.
Apart from pointing out the lovely costumes and the pretty enamelled pendant with a moon and pearls, the children and the dog, Phoebe could find little to say and, when the others had moved on round the corner towards the staircase, she stayed behind as if to commune with her namesake in private.
Lady Phoebe looked straight out of the picture, like her husband.
Phoebe waited. The voices on the staircase trailed away, as if into another time.
Lips moved almost imperceptibly as she watched.
No, it was not possible. There was no sound. She must have imagined it.
Yet a voice somewhere had told her to look. Look…look where?
On impulse, without questioning why, she turned to lean on the wooden rail to see down to the hall below where limpid figures moved, forwards, backwards, coming together and separating. Then she saw, mistily, the sharp flash of steel, the cold blue murderous glint of long rapiers, the white shirt of one figure catching the light from the windows of the north front. She could see through him, like smoky crystal.
She shook her head to clear it, to hear what was happening through the tunnels of silence that kept her attention fixed, but it was like a dream where only one sense was engaged. There was nothing to be heard, no shouts, no padding of feet, no squeal of blades, no cries from the figures who huddled into the corners, holding hands to their mouths. There was a large buxom woman with two young ladies standing beside a billiard table. Phoebe could just make out their faces, strangely transparent.
A billiard table?
There was a man wearing a long wig. He was large, stout, authoritative, a man from another era. As they all were. But now her attention was all on the two duellists, the more petite one of the two wearing a waistcoat over a shirt, tight breeches and white stockings. No shoes. A head of black curling hair like…like? She put a hand up to her head. Like herself. Phoebe. It was a woman, not a man. A woman. Phoebe Hawkynne. Duelling with…yes, her husband, the broad-shouldered athletic figure of the portrait Did he intend to kill her? Did they allow women to duel in those days? Is this what she was seeing? Those days?
Casting a furtive glance to each side of her, sure that she was unobserved, and devoid of any sense of being, she leaned forwards to watch the ghostly scene being enacted in utter silence below her, though she knew there should have been something to hear, a clatter, a shriek of blades, the panting as the woman was beaten back by her stronger opponent. She could feel her desperation.
A gold button went flying through the air as the tip of his rapier nicked the top of her waistcoat, and she threw up her arms in anger. The large man waved an arm, mouthing a command. The woman continued, but she was angry, slashing wildly at her opponent’s arm, while he called out something to the people on the fireplace side, hidden from Phoebe’s view, an arrogant remark that clearly unsettled the woman. At one point, she was given a moment to unbutton her waistcoat and fling it into a corner without waiting to see where it fell. But the watching Phoebe did, saw also how the gold button was picked up and held tight against the skirt of the taller young woman, how she retrieved the waistcoat and passed it to her mother, as if it were hers. Well, it might once have been, Phoebe thought, but not for some years, for the duelling Phoebe was slender and shapely. Few men would be able to keep their mind on the duel with that creature dancing balletically before them.
The duel began again, but already Phoebe could see how her namesake was tiring, her face showing pain and fatigue on every line, her sword arm drooping and unable to withstand Sir Leo’s punishing blows. He could, Phoebe thought, have plunged his rapier into her at any time, if he’d wanted to.
But apparently he did not, for instead of making an end to it or disarming her, he made her keep going, on and on, until she could no longer lift the point of her rapier from the floor. Then, backing her against the billiard table, bending her, he held his sword to her throat, barking out a command that failed to break through the silence, not even when her rapier slid across the floor, not even when her open mouth let out a stream of defiance, her face contorted by exhaustion. Only silence and a terrible tension that filled the hall below.
Horrified, entranced, spellbound, Phoebe saw all that happened after that; the prolonged humiliating victory kiss and the fascinated stare of the girl who had kept the button, the lo
ok of moonstruck adulation on her face which, for some strange reason, had become clear enough to show Phoebe the pain there, too. The other filmy figures swayed and stirred with relief, though there was distress in the way they conferred, unable to do more than watch Sir Leo lift the half-fainting woman into his arms and silently glide with her across to the bottom of the staircase.
Phoebe being carried upstairs, to where she was, eavesdropping. Imagining.
Except that she could never have imagined this. Never.
Sounds came from a distant place, faint sounds like the beginning of waking, fixing the senses with real substance, one after the other. They were coming up the stairs towards her.
But, no, as she turned to look, the dear familiar figure was not carrying anyone in his arms, nor was he wearing a white shirt with a slash on the sleeve, but a deep blue cutaway tailcoat with buff doeskin breeches and riding boots. Purposely, he strode towards her, his feet making a comforting clack-clack on the floor, his body as solid and real as life. Substantial. Beloved.
Clinging, afraid to let go of the banister rail for fear her trembling legs would give way, Phoebe heard his distant greeting through the loud hammering of her heart and a rushing sound of water. She tried to speak, but could only whisper, ‘Look!’ indicating with her head to the floor below.
But she knew, even as she spoke, that they had gone. The little figure who waved up to her was Claudette. Hetty was there talking to the Countess. Leon and Tabby Maskell were studying a portrait between the windows. The billiard table had vanished, the furniture slightly readjusted, solid and real.
‘Yes,’ said Ransome, ‘there they are. Waiting for you… why…what is it, sweetheart? You’re as white as a sheet. Is it the heat?’ Lifting her off the rail and pulling her into his arms, supporting her, he turned her away from the light towards the portrait, which now she was able to search with new eyes.
Lady Hawkynne stared out, as before, though Phoebe had not until this moment noticed the faintest of smiles playing around her mouth. Nor had she noticed something else, that just behind and to one side of her on a polished walnut table was a white linen garment draped over the corner, upon which was a reel of white linen thread and a pin-cushion, heavily beaded. The patch on the sleeve was clearly visible. To Phoebe, after her experience, the message could not have been clearer, though she knew that the symbolism would have been lost since the portrait was painted.
‘Nothing,’ she whispered, pressing her cheek against his immaculate neckcloth, ‘no, it’s nothing, dearest…dearest heart. Oh, hold me. Don’t let me go. Don’t ever let me go, Buck. Let me stay with you. Always.’
His arms slackened as he bent to look into her eyes, holding her chin up with his knuckle. ‘What’s all this, sweet Phoebe? Eh? Of course I shall not let you go. I’ve already told you so. You’re mine. I won you. Reservations or not.’
‘No reservations,’ she whispered. ‘Not a single one. I love you, Buck Ransome. I want to be your wife. For all the right reasons, dear one.’
Buck had never been one to waste words when kisses would do but now, uncharacteristically, the full impact of her declaration made him hesitate and search her deep brown eyes as if he would dredge her soul for the last grain of honesty. ‘I have waited,’ he said, ‘all my life to hear you say that to me. I have loved you and wanted you, and thought I’d lost you for ever, and now at last I have all I’ve ever wanted. The gloriously lovely Phoebe Hawkin telling me she loves me. Am I dreaming?’
‘No, my love. You’re not dreaming. It’s time for us to patch things up now. Let’s move on before it’s too late for both of us. It’s not your house I need, but you. Just you.’
‘You’ve always had me,’ he said, moving his lips closer to hers, ‘and I have carried you in my heart since you were a girl of sixteen. Can you understand why I took advantage of you so shamelessly? Can you forgive me?’
Phoebe smiled up at him, a bewitching radiant smile of complete understanding. ‘You are not the first to take advantage of a woman’s vulnerability, dear heart, and I don’t suppose you’ll be the last. It’s all in the name of love, isn’t it?’
She did not manage to catch the merry eye of Lady Hawkynne behind Buck’s head, for her own eyes were closed, the better to savour his deep kisses and to languish in the strength of his arms. Nevertheless, although there was nothing quite as concrete as a thought between the two Phoebes, the feeling passed to Madame Donville down the generations that men had their own methods of dealing with love and women had another. Yet it was up to the woman to let him think he’d won, and to mend the damage caused in the process, whatever it was. It also occurred to her, vaguely, that one’s relatives had a lot to answer for.
Chapter Eight
Ideally, Phoebe would like to have returned immedidately to Ferry House. With so much to think about, revelations, ghostly phenomena and the exchange of hearts, anything else was too much for one day. But one of the main reasons for being at Ham House was to bring Leon into contact with Lord Dysart and for them to discuss both their requirements.
So, although still deeply disturbed by what she had witnessed, if one could call it that, she sat through another hour after the departure of the Earl’s tenants, to talk over tea and Madeira cake about what the benevolent gentleman wanted from the artist as though it was Leon doing him a favour rather than the other way round. His commission was all the more important, he said, because he had not expected to inherit, nor did he have an heir to inherit after him.
If Leon wanted it, the work would keep him occupied indefinitely and, in return for that, he was offered a cottage in Ham village, a generous remuneration, stabling for his horses and an extra allowance for his materials. He could eat at Ham House whenever he wished, and the Countess would find him a housekeeper to see to all his needs. A few days previously, Leon would have wept at so much generosity. Now, however, he shook the Earl’s hand with just a trace of dewiness around the eyes that turned to laughter as everyone applauded, and Claudette hugged not only her uncle but her newly adopted grandfather too. But after loud complaints from Viscount Ransome and Mr Rowlandson, she was more or less obliged to do the same for them before order was restored. She took her Uncle Leon up to the gallery to see the Hawkynne portrait, and to show him how like Lady Phoebe he and his sister were.
It was agreed that Leon should take up his appointment as soon as he had put his London affairs in order, but tomorrow he could view the cottage and list whatever he needed for it. Although little was said about his amazing good fortune, it became obvious to all of them that both he and Phoebe had acquired a substitute father in Lord Dysart, for no one could have been more paternal. Whether he knew that the commission was exactly what Leon needed to keep him out of bad company he did not say, but perhaps it was his experience of young soldiers that helped to set Leon’s feet moving in the right direction.
Phoebe had already decided to keep her experience to herself. Since her own dear ones knew of her scepticism regarding Gothic apparitions, the kind of nonsense found in contemporary novels, she doubted her ability to convince them of what she’d seen. To be sure, it was almost as easy for her to begin doubting as it was to believe it, and even now she didn’t know if she could possibly have made it up. And where had Sir Leo carried his wife off to? Which room? And what then? She would love to have known what it was all about.
By the time they reached Richmond, the excitement of the day was beginning to make its effects felt, and although Phoebe was used to filling every moment with activity, this particular day had been an emotional one, for more than one reason. Her unusual quietness was noticed, and as soon as she had changed into an old muslin gown somewhere between dress and undress, Ransome was waiting to lead her out to the lawn overlooking the river where a supper table had been laid. She was given a well-padded day-bed to lounge on, her food was brought to her, her cider was iced, and her head was cushioned and shaded against the glare of the low sun as the day’s events were unfolded for review.
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But it was Hetty who took them further. ‘Mr Leon will need a housekeeper,’ she said, ‘and I think that position will suit me very well. I know his habits better than anyone else, and—’
‘But, Hetty dear, you can’t!’ said Phoebe. ‘You belong here.’
‘It’s only a change within the family, isn’t it? And truthfully, Phoebe, you’re not going to need a chaperon any more, are you? Besides, the Countess would like me to help her with the renovations. She finds it quite hard work now, and yet she cannot leave things entirely to her staff. If I were at Ham, I could help her. And,’ she added plaintively, ‘I’d like to.’
‘I’d like it too, Het,’ said Leon. ‘The cottage Lord Dysart is talking about is actually a six-bedroomed Queen Anne house big enough for a whole family.’
‘Then perhaps you should start thinking about acquiring one,’ said Ransome, laconically.
‘I intend to,’ replied Leon, swivelling his eyes towards Miss Maskell, ‘as soon as I can sort myself out.’
‘But,’ said Claudette, looking sulkily at her governess, ‘if Uncle Leon takes you away from me, what am I going to do for a governess?’
Miss Maskell laid a hand on Claudette’s knee. ‘Nobody is taking anyone away for quite some time, so stop worrying,’ she said, reassuringly.
‘Oh. Are you not going to drop your handkerchief, then?’
‘Claudette! Where on earth did you pick up such a vulgar expression?’
Cups rattled on saucers and discreet splutters became laughter. ‘I suppose that’s what comes,’ Phoebe said, ‘of playing with the village children. And,’ she continued, responding to Ransome’s steady look, ‘of allowing you to take part in adult conversation. The two are sure to become confused, now and then.’
‘Sorry,’ said Claudette. ‘I meant no disrespect.’
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