A Season of Secrets

by Margaret Pemberton

  When, within a week of knowing her, he’d asked her if she would marry him, Zephiniah hadn’t had to think about it. Just like Reggie, she needed a new start, in a new country. A month later, as man and wife, they had sailed for Buenos Aires.

  It hadn’t been a marriage made in heaven. He drank too much and soon, out of sheer boredom, she got in the habit of drinking too much too. He had affairs, and she had affairs. There had never been any children and, although Reggie accused her of being the one who was at fault, she had known, because of the secret she had never shared with him, that the fault lay with him. Out of the blue, aged fifty-eight, he had dropped dead of a heart attack while watching a tournament at the Campo Argentino de Polo de Palermo.

  At thirty-two, and at the height of her beauty, she was a widow. She hadn’t been a merry widow, though, because the financial position Reggie had left her in was dire. What she had needed was another husband – one with money, and fast.

  Reggie’s brother, who had now inherited the title – and who, like herself, was widowed – had written and asked if she would consider bringing Reggie’s ashes home to England so that they could be interred in the Warham family vault. Aware that agreeing to do so could well bring advantages in its wake, she had left for England carrying Reggie’s ashes in a tasteful silver-plated urn.

  Reggie’s brother had received the ashes with great courtesy and had shown more romantic interest in a male companion than he had in her. With hopes of becoming the next Countess of Warham swiftly extinguished, Zephiniah had shaken the Scottish Borders dust from her feet and headed speedily for London, where she intended devoting the summer to serious husband-hunting.

  At the first dinner party she had been invited to she had been introduced to Gilbert.

  ‘He’s very eligible, and I’ve seated you next to him,’ her hostess, a distant cousin, had whispered to her as they had made their way into the dining room. ‘He’s a government minister and a widower with three daughters, the eldest two well out of the school room. He’s owner of a divine country estate in Yorkshire, and his Mount Street house has one of the prettiest ballrooms in London. Add to that whispers that he could well be the next Tory prime minister, and you can well understand why he is so in demand socially.’

  Even before he had seated himself next to her, Zephiniah had been determined to end his days of widowhood.

  Doing so had been as easy as shooting fish in a barrel. That had been months ago now, and Zephiniah hadn’t looked back.

  Mrs Baldwin interrupted her thoughts by rising to her feet and saying, ‘I think it’s time we left the gentlemen to their port, ladies.’

  As Zephiniah, Clementine Churchill, Lady Dalwhinnie and the Dowager Duchess of Merion followed their hostess out of the dining room, Zephiniah gave a last interested glance in Max Bradley’s direction.

  He really was a most attractive man and possibly eight or nine years her senior, which meant he had to be at least twenty years older than Rozalind. Though he had said very little at the dining table, he had effortlessly made his presence felt. There was an exciting toughness about him; an overt sexuality. She had no doubt at all that if Max had been in Gilbert’s shoes a few hours earlier, he would have taken no notice when she said there was no time for lovemaking and her hair would now be disgracefully mussed. The thought sent a rush of heat through her body. She was looking forward to Max Bradley and her stepniece marrying. He would be a very welcome addition at family events.

  Unbeknown to her, the moment the dining-room door had closed behind her, Gilbert was discussing with Max exactly the kind of family events she had in mind.

  ‘You will be joining us at Gorton for Easter, won’t you?’ he was saying genially. ‘Rozalind arrives in London in a few days’ time and has written to say that you will still be this side of the Atlantic and able to join us all.’

  At the far end of the table the prime minister, Winston, Lord Dalwhinnie and Viscount Hubholme were occupied in lighting up Romeo y Julieta cigars. As they began puffing on them and discussing the difficulty the government was having with disaffected miners, Max said, ‘I appreciate the invitation, Gilbert. However, it’s one I’m unable to accept.’

  ‘That’s a shame.’ Gilbert was sincerely regretful. ‘I hadn’t realized you were heading back to Washington immediately.’

  ‘I’m not. It’s simply that my friendship with Rozalind is at an end – or will be very shortly.’

  Gilbert stared at him, bewildered. ‘I’m sorry, old chap. I don’t quite follow . . .’

  Max chewed the corner of his lip. He’d known this hellish conversation with Gilbert Fenton was going to have to take place sometime before Rozalind’s arrival, but he hadn’t envisaged it taking place this evening, at Number 10.

  ‘I’ve delayed getting married for long enough,’ he said, wishing he had a bottle of Jack Daniels in front of him instead of a bottle of port. ‘And in Washington there are limits to how high a man can rise politically without a suitable wife at his side.’

  ‘I understand that.’ Gilbert was more bewildered than ever. ‘But surely that means you and Rozalind should be announcing your forthcoming marriage – or is it that you’ve asked her to marry you and she’s turned you down? Is she finding the age difference too great? Is that the problem? Is—’

  Max lifted a hand, forestalling him. ‘You don’t realize it, but you’re making this even more difficult for me. What you have to understand – and what I have to make stone-cold clear – is that I’ve never led Rozalind to believe I was one day going to marry her. She’s known from the outset that there’s been someone waiting for me. Someone I’ve known since childhood. Someone with whom I’ve long had an understanding and, most importantly of all, someone who is far more suitable to be the wife of a politician than a dangerously headstrong girl who has only just celebrated her twentieth birthday.’

  Aware now where the conversation was heading, Gilbert was no longer bewildered. He was appalled.

  Under cover of loud laughter from the far end of the table, he said in a low, urgent voice, ‘Now look here, Max, let me put you straight before you say anything further. You’ve been Rozalind’s escort for nearly a year. Her father’s understanding – and mine – was that your intentions were honourable. If we’d thought otherwise we wouldn’t have been so tolerant. If, unknown to us, Rozalind has condoned your continuing friendship with an old flame, then I can only imagine she has done so out of youthful innocence as to the true nature of that friendship. Your action now, as an honourable man, is to end your former liaison once and for all – and, on your return to New York, to ask my brother-in-law for my niece’s hand in marriage.’

  A pulse throbbed at the corner of Max’s jawline. ‘That’s not possible, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Of course it’s damned well possible!’

  Winston and Viscount Hubholme, finally realizing that a heated exchange of words was taking place, shot them swift, curious glances. The prime minister and Lord Dalwhinnie, chuckling over a risqué joke, were oblivious to it.

  Max, wishing himself a million miles away, drew in a deep, steadying breath. ‘The reason it isn’t possible is a watertight one. My second cousin, Myrtle Benson-Davidson, is ideal in every respect as the wife of a man as politically ambitious as I am. She is mature, sophisticated – and as ambitious for me as I am myself. There are times in life when rational decisions have to be taken.’ He paused, unable to bring himself to continue.

  ‘And?’ Gilbert prompted, taut with tension.

  ‘And I took one.’ Looking like a man who already knew of the mistake he had made, Max said, ‘Three days before I sailed, I married Myrtle.’

  Chapter Eighteen

  JUNE 1928

  ‘So much has changed over the last couple of years,’ Thea said to Roz as they sprawled amidst deep grass at the vole place, ‘and yet where my love life and your love life are concerned, nothing has changed at all, has it? You are still unhappily in love with Max, and I’m still unhappily in love with H
al.’

  Roz rolled over onto her back and shielded her eyes from the hot sun. Where Max was concerned, there was a lot she wanted to share with Thea, but not knowing what her reaction was going to be when she did so, she put the moment off, saying instead, ‘When we were all last at Gorton at this time of the year, it was Zephiniah’s first visit. Where is she this year? Vichy again?’

  Thea pushed herself up one elbow. ‘No. This time she’s taking the waters at Aix-les-Bains. Papa misses her, but no one else does.’

  ‘Not even Olivia?’

  Thea shook her head. ‘Not even Olivia. They were in cahoots over Olivia’s wedding arrangements, because both of them wanted the same thing: to have the Tatler trumpet it as the wedding of the year—’

  ‘Which it did.’

  ‘But once the wedding was over, their initial enthusiasm for each other cooled.’

  ‘D’you think that none of you much liking Zephiniah is the reason she isn’t here? In London, not spending time in each other’s company is easy, isn’t it? At Gorton it’s pretty impossible to avoid one another.’

  ‘I rather think Zephiniah is indifferent as to whether we like her or not.’ Thea pushed herself up into a sitting position and hugged her knees. ‘She’d hoped to be pregnant by now. If she had been, I think she would be trying to focus all Papa’s attention on the newborn – especially if it was a boy – and trying to distance him from us. She doesn’t like the fact that he always has so much time for us, even when he doesn’t always approve of the causes we have taken up or the things we do.’

  ‘Those causes being your socialism, and Olivia following Dieter like a sheep in believing that the way ahead in Germany is Hitler’s National Socialist German Workers’ Party?’

  Thea gave a mirthless laugh. ‘Right. And let me tell you that the word “socialist” in the National Socialist German Workers’ Party has nothing to do with real socialism. Hitler has simply redefined the word by putting “national” in front of it, in order to appeal to the greatest number of people.’

  Tired of squinting against the sun in order to look at Thea, Rozalind too sat up, planting her hands flat on the grass behind her to give herself some support. ‘I don’t understand what attraction there is for Dieter in such a tinhorn political party. I thought its appeal was to the uneducated – and then only in Bavaria.’

  Thea ran a hand through short, turbulently curly hair. ‘Not according to Kyle. He says lots of educated Germans want to see their country as a force in the world again and not, as it is, a country humiliated by the terms of the Versailles Peace Treaty.’

  ‘And they think an Austrian corporal can bring that about?’

  ‘Apparently so.’

  They giggled at the silliness of it and then fell silent, enjoying the blissful heat of the sun on their backs and the soothing sound of the slow-moving river.

  After a little while Rozalind said, ‘And what about Violet? Is she still in disgrace?’ Her hair fell dramatically forward at cheekbone level on either side of her face, accentuating a fringe that came down to her eyebrows.

  Wishing that her own hair could be worn in such a straight and sleek fashionable style, Thea said with amusement in her voice, ‘She is, where Zephiniah is concerned. It was Zephiniah, after all, who selected the finishing school. Papa was shell-shocked – and most likely still is. An illicit romance between a pupil and a boy of about the same age from nearby Le Rosey would, after all, be understandable – or at least understandable where Violet is concerned. And as nearly all Le Rosey boys are the sons or grandsons of crowned heads, even Zephiniah would have forgiven Violet, in the hope of a happy outcome. But an illicit romance with the father of a fellow pupil? And a fellow pupil who is also the head girl?’

  They looked at each other and burst into helpless laughter.

  When she was able to speak again, Thea said, ‘Violet did it on purpose of course, in order that Papa would be asked to remove her. It was her way of showing Zephiniah – whom she refers to as the “wicked witch” – that she was never going to get the better of her.’

  Rozalind rose to her feet and walked the few steps to the edge of the river-bank. There was no sign of the voles, which wasn’t a surprise to her, after all the talking and laughing they had been doing.

  Laughing no longer, she stared down into clear grey-green water. ‘It’s a shame there couldn’t have been such a good outcome where Carrie was concerned,’ she said sombrely. ‘She wrote me about the uproar when Zephiniah discovered she was the granddaughter of your father’s old nanny, and of how outraged Zephiniah was that Carrie was treated at Gorton as if she were family.’

  Thea’s hands tightened around her knees. ‘That was when, with the exception of Papa, we all stopped feeling guilty about not liking Zephiniah. When she said that in future Carrie would not be welcome at Gorton, there were the most blistering rows. Though he tried hard to hide it, Papa was just as appalled as we were.’

  ‘Then why didn’t he overrule her?’ Rozalind turned to face her. ‘That was the part of things I didn’t understand. And though Carrie never said so in her letter, I know that was the part of it that hurt her the most.’

  Thea rose to her feet as if all her limbs ached. ‘Zephiniah conveniently announced she was enceinte. She wasn’t, but Papa didn’t know that and he wasn’t going to take the risk of her having a miscarriage. He met Carrie in Richmond, and Carrie said he explained to her how impossible it was for Zephiniah to cross class barriers, and that he owed it to Zephiniah to respect her wishes. He told her he hoped the situation would soon change, and that nothing would ever diminish the affection he held her in.’

  Rozalind said nothing, because there was nothing she could say. They both felt Gilbert should have behaved differently, and because they both thought the world of him, neither of them wanted to put their disappointment in him into words. She walked towards Thea, slipping her arm through hers. ‘Let’s get back to the house. The voles aren’t coming out to play, and we’re just depressing ourselves talking about the wicked witch. I suppose all that really matters is that your father is happy with her.’

  Thea made a moue of doubt. ‘He gives the impression he is, but between you and me, I think he’s beginning to find it a bit of a struggle.’

  As they began walking through buttercup-deep grass towards the bridge, Rozalind was very aware that although they had chatted about lots of things, they hadn’t chatted about what was going on in their personal lives. Thea had made one brief mention of Hal, as she had of Max, and then their names hadn’t been mentioned again – and Kyle’s name had only been mentioned in passing.

  Tentatively Rozalind asked, ‘How are things between you and Kyle? I know he’s pretty keen, because he’s told me so. Are the two of you on, or off?’

  ‘Oh God, Roz! I don’t know!’ Thea ran a hand distractedly through her hair. ‘I like him an awful lot. He’s a million miles more intelligent than most of the men I meet. He’s attractive, fun, and it’s nice having someone genuinely in love with me.’

  ‘But?’

  Beneath a V-necked, low-waisted silk dress the colour of burnt umber, Thea lifted slim shoulders and then dropped them eloquently. ‘But he isn’t Hal.’

  ‘You can’t go carrying a torch for Hal forever.’

  ‘Why not? You may be seen out and about with Barty whenever you’re in London, but you’d drop him in a flash if Max was single and crooked his little finger.’

  ‘That’s different.’

  ‘No, it isn’t.’ Thea’s eyes flashed fire. ‘When you love someone – really love someone – you don’t just stop loving them because they no longer love you. You keep on hoping that one day they’ll come to their senses and come back to you. Because, if you didn’t hope that, it would be so unbearable you would go mad.’

  Tears glittered on her eyelashes.

  ‘I love Hal so much, Roz, I simply can’t get my head around loving anyone else – not even when that someone else is as dishy as your stepbrother. What makes
it worse is that I know Hal wants me as much as I want him. He won’t acknowledge it, though. Where the class war is concerned, he sees loving me as being a sign of weakness and giving in to it would, in his eyes, be a betrayal of all his left-wing principles.’

  ‘Do you think he’ll marry Carrie?’

  ‘I think he’ll think about it – and he may well one day even ask her. But can you see Carrie living in London? It’s impossible, isn’t it? And what is even more impossible is the thought of Hal moving back to Outhwaite or Richmond.’

  Twenty minutes later they stepped inside Gorton and Rozalind was immediately encircled by its mellow charm. It wasn’t quite the same charm as in the past, though. There were flowers everywhere, as always, but the effect wasn’t the same as it had been when Blanche was alive. Then the flowers had nearly always been in gentle, subtle tones: milk-white roses massed in Chinese porcelain bowls; pink clove-scented carnations, ruffled and fringed; lilac anemones with indigo hearts; fragrant, pale-lemon freesias. Now the colour of the flowers was strident. Vivid reds, searing blues, blistering oranges, and whereas previously the flowers had always been arranged with great simplicity, now the arrangements were stiffly formal and over-poweringly ornate. There were lots of other changes, too.

  Blanche’s taste had been for cool, delicate colours. For as long as Rozalind could remember, the dining-room walls had been a translucent duck-egg blue and the walls in the main drawing room a pale yellow, offset by touches of white. Though Gorton itself was a stately Georgian gem, the overall feel of its interior was that of informality. No one stepping inside it could ever have been in any doubt that it was first and foremost a family home.

  Because Zephiniah was absent and Thea, Olivia and Violet were all present, that sensation wasn’t completely lost, but it was certainly diminished. The drawing room was a sea of crimson and gold. Sofas that were deep-cushioned and covered in chintz, so that it didn’t matter if a Fenton dog made itself comfy on them, had been replaced with brocaded, spindly-legged, French Empire sofas and chairs. Everywhere the rich wooden panelling had been ornately gilded.