I can’t think. When I was small my father once broke a thermometer just to show me the quicksilver. You couldn’t pick it up. It split and darted everywhere. This is like that: gleaming, uncatchable.
I turn back to face the front again. Everyone’s in place now. The Hambledons. Charity and Eleanor Stock-Browne. Renée Devereux is wearing a sable that still has teeth. Simon and Stephen Simmonds are there with their mother. Simon is wearing our old school tie. I catch his eye by mistake. He gives me a sympathetic grimace. I force myself to smile back. I turn my head to look at the other side of the room. The Ormondes’ half.
I only recognise a few of these people. Rosa Belle Marsden. Alec Finglass looks like an undertaker. Two of the Norwoods sit side-by-side. Identical noses, identical over-jewelled wives. Lord and Lady Latworthy. He’s reading the order of service and she says something to him and laughs. He looks up. Our eyes meet. He smiles and nods, as if what happened last night was nothing out of the ordinary. He turns aside. He replies to his wife.
A second later he looks back at me. He’s not expecting me still to be watching him. His expression is interested. Intimate. Knowing.
He’s read my book.
My breath checks in my throat. I don’t know how I know. Suddenly my heart is sucking blood in the wrong direction, swollen, hammering. Heat and cold run over me in waves.
‘Lucian? You all right?’
I turn aside. I must be imagining this. The stress of the occasion. The overscented air. The rows of eyes on me. The creep of the clock’s ornate minute hand towards the hour. I try not to look at him again. But I do.
‘Lucian? Lucian! Where are you going? You can’t just …’
I knock Henry out of the way with my shoulder. There’s a door at this end of the room, an antechamber. I don’t care if I have to scramble out of the window. He bleats something. I don’t look at him. ‘I’ll be back in a moment.’
‘But she’ll be here in two minutes.’
I shut the door on him.
I’m in a sunken alley at the side of the building. I walk blindly to the end of it. Suddenly I’m at the front, where a wide staircase leads down from the main entrance. A carriage is drawing up. A pale lacy figure clambers out on to the pavement and nearly trips. The wind whips her dress into a white flag. Mr Ormonde steadies her and leads her up the stairs. A gust lifts her veil. I catch sight of flushed cheeks. Bright eyes. A thin lace-mittened hand holding a bunch of roses. The flash of the diamond I gave her.
If I hurried I could get back before anyone noticed.
I swing sideways and cross the road. There’s a queue for the omnibus. A few men stare into the window of a butcher’s. A woman with a basket over her arm tuts at me. I turn round, borne on the current of passers-by. A spatter of sleet strikes my face.
‘Daily news,’ a man shouts. ‘Taxes to go down! Bookbinder killed in fire!’
A man pauses and buys a paper. I approach the stall, fumbling in my pocket. I don’t have any money. I go on fumbling and lean over to scan the dense columns of print. A tragic accident last night led to … secretary, Miss Elizabeth Brettingham, said there were no survivors … called upon to accelerate the inquiry into the storage of inflammable materials … My gorge rises.
The newspaper-seller steps between me and the page. ‘You going to buy one, or not?’
‘No. Excuse me.’
I wrench myself away. Any moment now Henry will emerge into the forecourt of the Town Hall. But there’s nowhere to run to. I can’t go home. I’m stuck on the pavement as if it’s quicksand. Make a decision. Move.
I duck into the archway that leads to the arcade. At least here I’ll be under a roof. I push past a man standing in a doorway. He reaches out and grabs my wrist. I try to shake him off. But his grip is stronger than I expected. I start to say, ‘I haven’t got any—’
‘Playing truant?’ he says.
It’s Emmett Farmer.
I stare at him. Surely if I were hallucinating he’d look exactly the way he did the last time I saw him. Or at the very least, he’d be flushed and laughing, reeling with fatigue, with his shirt open at the neck. But now he’s dressed differently, in rougher, warmer clothes. His eyes are clearer. Steadier. He has a knapsack over his shoulder, and a woollen cap.
Behind him the omnibus arrives. The newspaper man goes on calling his headlines. The sleet makes a silver fan on the floor at the entrance to the arcade.
‘What on earth …?’
He said it. Or did I? Doesn’t matter. He’s still holding my wrist like a handcuff.
I clear my throat to make sure I know my own voice. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘It’s a free country,’ he says, but the bravado doesn’t reach his face. ‘I wanted to see you. And her.’ He hesitates. ‘Your wife.’
‘Well.’ I try to bite back a foolish, painful laugh. ‘I’m afraid you might be waiting longer than you thought, for that.’
It’s no good. I giggle once, violently, as if I’m being sick.
‘What’s going on? You should still be in there.’ He nods at the Town Hall.
‘I ran away.’
‘You ran away? Just like that?’ There’s a split-second pause. Maybe we’re both thinking the same thing: that I ran away from him, too. But he doesn’t give me time to explain, or apologise, even if I could. ‘What about Miss Ormonde?’
‘I don’t know.’
His eyes narrow. ‘What?’
I shake my head. I can still see her, at the centre of that whirling veil, her face flushed. She asked me to be kind.
‘Lucian, what are you doing?’
‘I can’t marry her. She’s a good – a good person. She deserves better.’
He lets go of me and turns away. A couple of young women hurry into the arcade. One of them skids on the damp marble and the other catches her. They laugh like machines clanking. He watches them go past. ‘So she should be grateful that you’re jilting her at the altar.’
‘I didn’t say …’ I look down. Of everyone in the world, I thought Farmer would understand. I can feel wetness inside my glove, but it hasn’t soaked through. I stretch my fingers to feel the kid pull away from the stickiness on my skin. ‘It’s just … wrong. For her. For me. Does it matter?’
‘And me? Should I have been grateful that you …? Never mind.’ He turns away as I open my mouth. ‘No, I said never mind.’
There’s a silence, full of the newspaper man and hurrying footsteps and the crunch of wheels on half-frozen mud. Inside the hall she’ll be waiting for me. Or someone will have taken her to one side. Henry will be searching, frantically trying not to seem frantic.
Farmer sighs. He takes off his cap, wipes his forehead with the inside of his wrist, and puts it back on. At last he says, ‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’
‘I saw one of them look at me.’ My mouth tastes sour. Metallic. ‘He’d read my book. I saw it in his face. He was watching me.’ I don’t want to tell Farmer about Lord Latworthy, and what happened last night. Silence. In the street a wheel-axle smashes. Someone shouts. Someone else shouts back, louder. I shrug. ‘That’s it.’
‘Someone looked at you, and you walked out of your wedding.’
I tug uselessly at my glove. ‘Yes.’
‘I didn’t know you were so brave.’
‘To abandon Honour at the altar?’
He tilts his head to concede the point. A gust of wind whirls down the arcade, scattering bits of rubbish around our feet. I shiver. Somehow I thought that leaving the hall would make things different. I lean against the wall and take a sip from my hip flask. I offer it to him. He shakes his head.
I look at my shoes. The sleet and mud have tarnished their perfect shine. ‘What will you do now?’
‘I pawned some of my old master’s things,’ he says. ‘I’ve got enough money for the train to Newton. I thought I might try to find a bindery there.’
‘A bindery? Why?’
He takes a deep breath and adjusts the strap of his
knapsack. ‘Because I’m a binder, Lucian.’
I nod. He’s right. He has a trade. A living. He can have a life like de Havilland’s. Why not?
‘I wish …’ Emmett shifts from side to side. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t be.’ I drain the last fiery dregs of brandy.
‘I can’t stay here, Lucian.’
Can I hear Henry’s voice, coming and going on a gust of wind, or am I imagining it? I lean my head back and stare at the intricate panes of smut-stained glass. Directly above us there’s a shatter-mark. A star. ‘Well then,’ I say. ‘Good luck.’
‘Yes.’
I hold out my hand. ‘Thanks for trying to help.’
‘Yes.’ He swallows, and takes it. Neither of us has taken off our gloves. He’s wearing a ring and it digs into my fingers. My cut stings. It goes on aching as he steps backwards. The pain runs up my arm like a rope. It catches round my heart and pulls tight.
‘Goodbye, Emmett.’
He nods. He goes on nodding. I put my hip flask in my pocket. I’m so cold. A child runs past us, bowling a hoop, screeching with laughter. A gaunt governess in half-mourning follows a few paces behind.
He doesn’t say goodbye. He holds my gaze for one more breath. Then he turns and walks down the arcade, away from me.
I put my forearm over my face. It must look as if I’m crying. It doesn’t matter now.
I should have stayed in the hall. By now it would be done.
My shirt itches. My shoes have chafed my ankles. My breath smells of brandy. I didn’t have breakfast and the alcohol has already gone to my head. I could pawn my watch. Go to a public house and get drunk. Walk into the river. No, of course not. Go home. When I left this morning the garlands over the staircase were starting to wilt. Red petals fell as I walked past. Empty rooms, dead flowers.
‘Wait. Wait.’ Someone is running down the arcade, shouting. I open my eyes. My vision breaks into a kaleidoscope of colours. I blink. It’s Emmett.
He drops his bag at his feet and takes hold of my shoulders. ‘What did you say?’
‘What? When?’
‘You said someone had read your book.’
I try to shake him off but he’s stronger than me. ‘Yes. Lord Latworthy. It made me—’
‘Lord Latworthy. Lord Latworthy has read your book. Are you sure?’
‘Yes.’
He stares at me. He’s not seeing me at all. The blood thuds through my veins.
‘And he was there. At your wedding. He’s’ – he points backwards – ‘there. Right now?’
‘Yes. Why?’
He smacks his forehead. ‘I’m such an idiot. Come on, I know where he lives.’
It takes me a second to understand what he means. ‘Just because he’s read it, doesn’t mean he has it now.’
‘I took a delivery there myself. I should have realised.’ He breathes out, half laughing, and catches my wrist. ‘Stop arguing, Lucian.’ He starts to run. I nearly trip as he drags me after him. ‘We don’t have long. Come on.’
XXVII
The hansom takes us to the gates. It’s a mile or so out of town. A dark stone wall runs alongside the road, topped with ranks of iron arrow-heads. Beyond it the parkland slopes up towards the house. Bare oaks are scattered on snow-blotched grass. The gate is massive and wrought iron, hung with fruit and leaves. In the monochrome landscape it’s a parody of summer.
We roll to a stop. A sudden panic grabs me. I have nothing in my pockets except my hip flask and my watch. But Farmer jumps out ahead of me and pays. As the cab drives away he catches my eye. Without a word he digs in his pocket again. He holds out a coin to me.
‘I don’t want that.’
He lets the money fall into the gutter. It sticks in a grainy ripple of slush, edge upwards, almost invisible. Something has changed in the way he moves. There’s light behind his eyes even when he’s not smiling. But all he says is, ‘Come on. We have to hurry.’
‘What’s the plan, exactly?’
‘We go in. We find your book. We get out. Before Lord Latworthy gets back from your wedding.’
Latworthy might be on his way already. How long will it take? I can see the Town Hall in my mind’s eye. A growing unease. No, a growing enjoyment. Men swapping sidelong looks. Hidden smiles. Flowers and feathers nodding as women put their heads together to whisper. When Henry comes back in, wilting with defeat, there’ll be some kind of council-of-war. My father and the Ormondes. Twenty minutes? Then to explain to the guests … With any luck there’ll be more delay as people take in the news. Gossip. Speculate. Have breakfast anyway. Some people have travelled from miles away. I kick at a ridge of muddy ice until my shoe is caked in it.
Farmer touches my shoulder. ‘Don’t think about it.’
‘I can’t not.’
‘Let’s go.’ He sets off up the drive. The meadows on either side are wide open. Foothills of unmelted snow are being eaten away by the brown sea of grass. Anyone looking down from the turrets of the house would see us immediately. The clouds hang above like a ceiling. Every time I glance up they seem to have dropped lower.
Get in. Find book. Get out. Simple.
The drive curves. It takes us through a grove of trees and round the crest of the hill. The house is the same dark stone as the wall. It looks like a fortress. The fountain in front is a dry basin of alabaster. The mermaids are streaked with green. I hurry to catch up with Emmett. ‘Wait!’
‘Come on.’ He turns left, towards the back of the house. There’s a huge stable yard, double the size of the one at my uncle’s house. Windows look down on us from every side. The cobbles are gleaming wet. At the far corner a man in working clothes looks up. I stop dead. He stares for a second and goes back to sluicing the ground clean with a bucket of water. Emmett beckons me. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘That man saw us.’
He shrugs. He crosses the yard to a door set into the wall. I follow him. He rings the bell.
‘Emmett.’ I glance around. Any moment now someone will ask what we’re doing here. The man at the corner of the yard catches my eye again. He picks up his empty bucket and takes it into a lean-to. He’s whistling. It sounds too loud.
Emmett frowns at me. ‘What?’
‘We can’t just ring the bell and ask if we can ransack the library.’
‘It’s all right. Trust me.’
Footsteps come down the passage. I can hear them patter on stone.
I drag him away from the door. He stumbles sideways. ‘What are you doing? Lucian?’
‘Let’s go round to the front. I can try to convince the butler. We won’t get anywhere with the tradesman’s entrance.’
‘What, they’ll trust you because you’re wearing a flashy waistcoat?’
‘Better than you trying to—’
The door swings open. A scullery-maid in a drab dress and grey pinafore peers out. She’s wearing grimy cotton cuffs around her wrists and holding a smeared rag. ‘Sally,’ Emmett says. ‘You remember me. From de Havilland’s. I brought those boxes, last week.’
She stares at him. Her mouth makes a silent O.
He steps forward. She squeaks, and nearly trips over the mat. Then, as if the noise has released something, she whispers, ‘Mr Emmett?’
‘Yes. Listen—’
‘You’re dead. They said you were dead. Mr Enningtree said it was in the paper—’
He blinks. ‘I’m definitely not dead.’ He spreads his arms wide and his knapsack slides down to his elbow. ‘Look.’
‘But …’ She screws up her mouth. For the first time her eyes go to me. She frowns. She bounces slightly as if she isn’t sure whether to curtsy. ‘All right then … I suppose … But what’re you doing here? Mr Enningtree didn’t say anything about a delivery.’
‘Listen, Sally. I need to talk to Lord Latworthy. It’s important.’
‘He’s not here. He’s gone to a wedding.’ Her eyes slide back to me. Surreptitiously I take the rose out of my buttonhole and push it into my pock
et.
‘I’ll wait. Show us into the library. We won’t be any trouble.’
‘I ought to ask Mr Enningtree – I can’t just let you in, you’re only an apprentice – I mean, even Mr de Havilland has to make an appointment.’
‘Don’t. It has to be secret. Please, Sally.’
‘A secret? It’s more than my position’s worth.’
‘It’s binder’s business. Come on. You know who I am. Please.’
She looks at him, furrowing her brow, and then at me. ‘No.’
There’s a silence. Sally twists the rag into a scrawny knot. I can smell silver polish. Pink paste has got into the cracks around her knuckles. She dips her head briefly, regretfully, at the space between Emmett and me. Then she starts to swing the door shut.
Emmett pushes his foot into the gap. ‘Wait.’
‘I’m sorry, Mr Emmett. But I can’t.’
‘Look at me.’ He steps close to her. She stands still in the doorway. She’s staring at her feet. ‘Look at me, Sally.’
Slowly she raises her head.
He leans forward. His mouth is almost touching her ear. In a low voice, he says, ‘Do what I say, right now. Or I’ll take your whole life away.’
She catches her breath. Her eyes flicker. ‘Mr Farmer, sir …’
‘You know what I mean, don’t you? I’ll put your memories in a book. You won’t even remember your own name.’ There’s a pause. My own breath is coming short. Emmett pushes gently against the door and she steps backwards, giving up ground. ‘I don’t want to do that. I like you. But I need to get into the library now.’
She raises her face. She’s gone white. ‘Please – don’t …’
‘Good girl.’ He steps past her into a dingy little passage. He beckons to me without turning his head. ‘Now. We’re going to be in the library. If you make sure we’re not disturbed, everything will be all right. Do you understand?’
She nods. She clears her throat. ‘When milord comes back …?’
‘Then you can come and tell us he’s here.’
She nods again. She keeps nodding. Her eyes are fixed on Emmett’s face. She gestures to the end of the corridor. ‘Shall I show you to the library?’
The Binding Page 38