Sea of Lost Love

by Santa Montefiore

  At the end of Mass the congregants spilled out into brazen sunshine that seemed to mock the solemnity of the day. The people of Pendrift paid their respects to Elizabeth, Julia and Archie, Penelope and Milton, smiling sadly at the children, who stood around like animals in a zoo, trying to ignore the assault of curious spectators. Celestria stood apart from the crowd with Lotty and Melissa, who were determined to save their cousin from having to talk to the locals. “As if you haven’t been through enough,” said Melissa sharply, watching her mother shaking hands with people she had never seen before.

  “That’s the penance for being the most important family in town,” said Lotty with a sigh. “Everyone feels they own a part of you.”

  “No,” said Celestria, shaking her head so that the feathers of her hat floated up and down as if about to fly off. “It’s because Papa was so loved. Everyone here believes they were his intimate friend. They haven’t just lost a distant member of the community, but a friend. I barely recognize them, but Papa knew them all by name. And the older ones, like Old Beardy over there,” she pointed to Merlin, who stood, hat in hand, talking to Archie, “I bet he knew Papa when he was a boy.”

  Suddenly a middle-aged woman broke away and approached the three girls. She was buxom and attractive, with hair the color of a field mouse drawn into a bun beneath a navy blue hat. Celestria knew she had seen her somewhere before, but she couldn’t place her. The woman hesitated a moment and seemed to wilt under Celestria’s imperious gaze. Hastily she squared her shoulders, spurred on by the respect she felt for the girl’s father. “I’m Mrs. Craddick,” she said in a soft, girlish voice that curled around her vowels like wood smoke. Celestria extended her hand. “I just wanted to tell you how sorry I am about your father. He was a good, kind man. The best.” She smiled and lowered her eyes as the apples of her cheeks flushed pink.

  “Thank you,” Celestria replied, wishing the woman would go away. Instead, Mrs. Craddick lifted her gaze, now glittering with tears, and continued.

  “You see, my little boy’s been very ill. Very ill indeed. We thought he might die. But your father, Mr. Montague, found the best doctor and paid for him to be treated. He told me never to tell anyone. Well, he didn’t want to embarrass my husband. You see, I don’t want his kindness to go unnoticed. It’s only right that you and the rest of the family should know what he did for others. He was a selfless man, Miss Montague.”

  “How is your son now?” Lotty asked.

  “Oh, he’s on the mend, thank you, Miss Flint.” She looked at Celestria again. “If it weren’t for your father, my Rewan would…” She stopped suddenly, catching her breath. “Well, I won’t keep you.” She turned and fled, melting back into the sea of dark suits and hats.

  “Did you know about that?” Melissa asked Celestria.

  Her cousin shook her head. “No.”

  “What a dark horse Uncle Monty was,” said Lotty, impressed.

  Celestria narrowed her eyes, recalling the conversation she had overheard between Julia and Monty in the library. “So dark he’s invisible,” she added dryly. “I’m beginning to think I don’t know my father at all.”

  When Celestria returned to the Hall, she went straight up to see her mother. Pamela was sitting in bed in a cashmere cardigan and nightdress, trying to feed Poochi a piece of bread and pâté. When she saw her daughter, she raised eyes that were red rimmed and shiny. “He won’t eat.”

  “He will when he’s hungry,” Celestria replied, unbuttoning her coat.

  “He’s lost his appetite.”

  “Haven’t we all.”

  “I never thought Poochi cared for your father. But he’s obviously devastated.”

  “Have you sent a telegram to Grandpa?” Celestria took off her hat and began to pick out the pins in her hair in front of the mirror on Pamela’s dressing table.

  “I don’t want to bother him until we know for sure.”

  Celestria’s shoulders hunched, and she fiddled with one of the pins absentmindedly. “Oh, I think we do know for sure.”

  “Until there’s a body I refuse to believe it.”

  “There might never be a body, Mama. As Aunt Penelope so tactfully put it, he might be inside the belly of a fish.”

  “They don’t have fish that big off the coast of Cornwall,” Pamela objected. “What does that silly woman know, anyway?” Suddenly she began to cry. “Oh, for goodness’ sake, you silly pooch, eat!”

  Celestria perched on the edge of the bed and took her mother’s hand.

  “What are we going to do?” Pamela howled. “I can’t go on without Monty. He was everything to me. How could he put me through this? If he was unhappy, he could have told me. We could have worked it out. But to go and kill himself is so unbelievably selfish.”

  “We’ll just have to make do,” said Celestria, having to be strong for her mother. “Harry will go back to school. We’ll return to London. Life will continue as it always has. Papa will no longer be there, that’s all.” There was a long silence as Pamela digested her daughter’s words. Then suddenly she grabbed Celestria’s hand.

  “Oh, Celestria. I’ve lied to you.”

  “Lied to me? What about?”

  “Your father and I. The night he disappeared. We did have a fight.”

  “What about?”

  “He’s a terrible flirt.”

  “Papa?”

  “Oh, darling. You’re too young to know about such things. You’re innocent, naïve.” Celestria thought of Aidan Cooney but felt nothing but an unbearable emptiness inside. Pamela ran a hand down her daughter’s cheek. “He loves beautiful women. Of course, I’m used to his flirting and turn a blind eye most of the time. But it doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt, to watch him turn those honey eyes on someone younger and prettier than me. No one can resist him when he looks at them in that way. It’s like he’s seeing right through you and into you and knows what you want and what your life is lacking. But the other night, it was the straw that broke the camel’s back. We got upstairs, and I flew at him. I told him that he was too old to go around chatting up young girls, that it made him look a fool.” She drew her fingers across her eyes to wipe away the tears. Her nails were long and red and perfectly manicured. “Then I told him I didn’t want him to spend so much time traveling. That it wasn’t fair to leave me alone so often.”

  “What did he say?” Celestria asked in a small voice.

  Pamela’s face crumpled with distress. “He got so angry, he didn’t look like himself at all. It was like a stranger had suddenly got inside of him. He told me his flirting was harmless. That it was just a bit of fun. It made him feel alive, he said. He argued that he worked his backside off so that you and I could have nothing but the best, and that Harry could have the finest education England has to offer. He raged that Elizabeth pushes and pushes him to be perfect and that her standards are so high he can’t possibly meet them all of the time. He said he was weary of being corroded by us, like a rock in a vast sea of demanding people, wearing him down little by little until he’d have nothing left to give. He told me I was spoiled and greedy.” Her shoulders began to shake. “He said the sooner you married, the better, because you were only going to turn out like me, driving him insane with your demands.”

  “He said that?”

  “He said some terrible things, darling. It must have been the alcohol. I swear, I have never seen him like that before. Now it’s going to haunt me for the rest of my life because that is the way I will remember him.”

  Celestria sat in silence, a frown lining her brow. She felt as if her mother had just cut out the bottom of her world, sending her tumbling into a hole where there was nothing to grab hold of to stop her falling. She swallowed hard and tried to ignore the ache in her throat.

  “Did he kill himself to punish us?” Celestria asked. Her voice came out thin and reedy. “Because we made too many demands? Well, that’s nothing compared to the hell he’s putting everyone through, is it? Father Dalgliesh says that suicide is a
mortal sin and that he’s gone straight to hell.”

  “He said that?” Pamela asked. “Monty is in hell?”

  “I don’t know why you’re looking so surprised, you don’t believe in heaven and hell.”

  “No, I don’t. There is no hell, just other people.” She laughed cynically.

  Celestria sighed and stood up. “Well, Mama, don’t forget to wire Grandpa. He needs to know. I’m going to write to him myself.”

  That afternoon, Celestria sat at her uncle’s desk and opened the top left-hand drawer. Inside, in neat piles, were letterheads and cards for correspondence. She tried to imagine her father’s frame of mind as he had sat there in the middle of the night, deliberating what to write in his suicide note. Surely, she thought, if one is about to take one’s life, one would want to explain to one’s family, to leave them with some peace of mind. Instead, her father had written two meaningless words. Forgive him for what? Taking his own life? Putting his family through hell? Fighting with his wife? For saying such horrid things about his daughter, who was determined never to turn out like her mother, by the way?

  She pictured him standing by the window, where she had found him the night of the party. He had looked so different. Solemn and troubled. There had been a ruthlessness to his face that had frightened her. When he had seen her there, his features had softened, restoring to her once again the ebullient father she loved. Slowly she began to put together the pieces gleaned from the conversations she had had with her mother and Aunt Julia and from the couple of times she had spied on him when he had not known that he was being watched. She was more certain than ever that while the rest of the family had blithely enjoyed their summer holiday, Robert Montague had been hiding a dark secret.

  She pulled out a sheet of paper and took a pen from the tray on top of the desk. Darling Grandpa, she began. Something terrible has happened, and I need your help…

  Elizabeth Montague stood in Father Dalgliesh’s parlor, gazing out of the window into the garden. Her hand gripped her walking stick, and her face was rigid with indignation. He offered her a chair, but she would not take it. “My son is not dead,” she declared, without looking at the priest. She sensed pity in his expression, and, if there was one thing she abhorred, it was pity. “You don’t know my son, do you, Father?”

  “I haven’t had that pleasure, Mrs. Montague,” he replied.

  “Well, let me tell you about him, then. He is an exceptional man—a wonderful son to me and a wonderful husband, father, brother, and friend. He wouldn’t let us down like this. It isn’t in his nature. He shines brighter than the brightest star. Everyone loves him. I’ll wager there isn’t a person in Pendrift who doesn’t think the world of him. Now why would a man so beloved take his own life?” Her chin wobbled, but she restrained it with a determined stiffening of the jaw.

  “I am at a loss,” he replied.

  “He is a success. Everything he touches turns to gold. He has that Montague charm, like his father. Young Bouncy has it; Celestria, too, though what good is it in a girl as superficial as Celestria? It’s wasted. You know, Robert made his first fortune when he was a very young man. He traveled the world determined to prove himself. Archie came into the world with a niche already carved out for him. His destiny was here at Pendrift. Robert had to carve his niche on his own. I never doubted he’d return in glory. Robert has more ability, intelligence, and wit than my other two children put together. He persuaded us to invest in a sugar venture in Brazil. We didn’t hesitate, and we were right to trust him. Robert made us all rich.” She turned her rheumy eyes to the priest. “I know a mother shouldn’t love one child over and above her other children, but I do. I love Robert the best. He makes me very proud.”

  Father Dalgliesh didn’t know what to say. He stood awkwardly knitting his fingers while this formidable woman stared at him defiantly. He wished God would inspire him with the right words to comfort her, but he heard nothing.

  “It is in God’s hands,” he said clumsily.

  “Perhaps,” she snapped, turning to face the garden again. “I expected to outlive my husband, but I never expected to outlive my son. My youngest child. My most beloved Robert. No, I will not accept it. If he was in trouble, he would have told me. I’m his mother. He would have come to me.”

  “All we can do is pray for his deliverance.”

  “Prayer,” she sniffed dismissively. “I’m devout. I pray constantly. Where has it got me?” She shuffled past him. “I was rather hoping you’d offer me a miracle, Father Dalgliesh.”

  “I wish I were able to.”

  “Well, if you can’t turn water into wine, you had better pray. I shall pray, too, with the rest of my family. He’s in God’s hands now. There’s nothing more we can do.”

  10

  Three days passed and nothing was seen of Robert Montague. Pendrift descended into a state of mourning. There no longer remained any doubt of his suicide, not even in the Snout & Hound, that hotbed of gossip and intrigue. The family grieved for him, except for Elizabeth, who resolutely declared that no child of hers would ever do such a thing.

  Father Dalgliesh spent most of his time counseling the townspeople. The air in his parlor was thick with the perfume of weeping women who had all loved Monty, not as a lover, but as a good and kind man who had always put others before himself. How, they asked, could a man who had everything to live for throw his life away? Father Dalgliesh answered as best he could, drawing on the training he had received at the seminary. During these visits he began to gain a better understanding of the man everyone knew as Mr. Monty. He had touched each and every one of them in some way or other, from a simple chat in the Snout & Hound to paying young Rewan Craddick’s hospital bills. Whatever form it took, there was no doubt that Mr. Monty had improved people’s lives. And yet, Father Dalgliesh was no wiser than they were. “Why,” he asked himself, repeating the question he had been asked over and over again, “would a man who had everything to live for throw his life away?”

  Then, on Thursday morning, he received an unexpected visitor.

  Father Dalgliesh was at his desk, seeing to his correspondence, for which he had had little time in the last few days, when there was a knock at the door. He heaved a sigh. Another troubled soul to attend to in the parlor, no doubt. He put down his pen. “Come in,” he replied. The young curate, Howel Brock, poked his face around the door.

  “I’m sorry to disturb you, Father, but there’s a lady here to see you. She says it’s important.”

  “Did she say her name?”

  “No. She says it’s a private matter.” Father Brock raised his eyebrows. “She’s wearing a hat and dark glasses,” he added. “Very mysterious.”

  Father Dalgliesh’s curiosity was aroused. He got up, straightened his waistcoat, then proceeded to the parlor. Miss Hoddel was cleaning the tiled floor in the corridor with a shabby mop. When she saw Father Dalgliesh, she stood up and leaned on the handle, wiping a grubby hand on her floral apron.

  “You’ve got Greta Garbo in there,” she said with a chuckle. Father Dalgliesh ignored her and opened the door.

  The strange woman perched awkwardly on the edge of the sofa, a small, fluffy dog lying sleepily on her knee. She was strikingly beautiful in a black tailored jacket and skirt and black lizard shoes that were pressed together at an angle to her body. Around her neck she wore a pearl and diamond choker. Her hat was small and pinned to the side of her head, from where a thin veil of netting fell down to her nose. When she saw him, she did not smile, but took off her dark glasses to reveal icy blue eyes that were cold but captivating. Father Dalgliesh’s heart missed a beat. She was the image of her daughter.

  “My name is Pamela Bancroft Montague,” she said in an American accent. “My husband is Robert.” At the mention of his name, she lowered her eyes so that her long black lashes almost brushed her cheeks. She was very carefully made up, but powder and lipstick could not disguise her distress. She stroked her dog with a gloved hand.

  “I�
�m very sorry for your loss, Mrs. Bancroft Montague,” said the priest, sinking into the armchair opposite.

  She inhaled with difficulty and shook her head. “My husband was a devout Catholic, as I’m sure you are aware.”

  “Indeed.”

  “I, on the other hand, am nothing. I’m an atheist.”

  “You don’t believe in God?”

  “I don’t know,” she mumbled, not able to look him in the eye.

  “Then you are agnostic.” He smiled at her reassuringly.

  “That doesn’t sound so bad, does it?”

  “God is there, Mrs. Bancroft Montague, whether you believe in Him or not. He waits patiently for you to open your heart and eyes. His love is unconditional.”

  “I want to believe, Father. I do.” She heard Miss Hoddel knock her mop against the door. “This will remain confidential, won’t it?” she murmured.

  “Of course.”

  “I don’t want my husband’s family to know that I have come.”

  “One moment,” he said, getting up. Father Dalgliesh walked over to the door. When he opened it, a blushing Miss Hoddel almost tumbled in. She straightened up and smoothed down her apron. “Would you be very kind, Miss Hoddel, and make us a pot of tea. Perhaps you might tidy my study afterwards. I have noticed it’s got quite dusty lately.”

  “I’ll have to clean around your books, Father,” she replied irritably.

  “I’m afraid I still haven’t had time to sort them all out.”

  “As you wish,” she said, bending down to pick up the steel bucket of dirty water. “Though it does my back no good at all.” As she moved away she cast a glance into the parlor, where the strange woman sat with her back to the door.

  “I’ve got no one to turn to,” Pamela continued when Father Dalgliesh returned to his seat. “I have to be strong for my children, you see.”

  “Celestria and Harry,” he said, nodding.

  “You’ve met them. I’m afraid the day you came for lunch I was suffering from a migraine. I get them occasionally. Well, Monty was my rock, Father. He was my whole world. Now he’s gone, I feel I’m all alone.”