Kate's Progress

by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

  Kate couldn’t help sniggering. ‘Pocahontas?’

  ‘She also gave us a talk on how she’s descended from some famous Indian brave.’ He gave her a solemn look. ‘I’m expecting her to come down to dinner in fringed leather, beads and a headband. Feather optional. Don’t you think she looks like a Red Indian, with the cheekbones and the hair?’

  ‘Oh God, you’re not allowed to call them that,’ Kate said, trying not to laugh. ‘They’re Native Americans.’

  ‘Well, I’m a Native English, and I don’t boast about it.’

  The magnificent oak staircase led to various oak-panelled corridors, and Jack led her along one, and opened a door into a smallish, rather dark room, also panelled, with a small fireplace, an enormous wardrobe taking up too much space, and a single iron bedstead.

  ‘This is you,’ he said, ‘It’s one of the bachelor rooms. Bit Spartan, but we had to put the couples in the bigger rooms. Bathroom at the end on the left.’ He pointed down the corridor. ‘One advantage is that I’m just two doors down – thrown out of my pit for Greg and Sasha – so if you wanted to visit, nothing could be easier.’ He ran a hand over her bare forearm.

  ‘And which room were you planning to put your wife in?’ she asked him pleasantly.

  ‘Ex-wife. She’d be upstairs in the nursery wing,’ he said. ‘She’d never know a thing.’

  Kate laughed. ‘Good job I know you don’t mean any of this.’

  ‘My dear girl, why else do you think I got Camilla to invite you? Now, we need a signal. You could look at me and tap the side of your nose like this during the evening if it’s on for later. Or maybe that’s too obvious. Just leave your shoes outside the door and I’ll see them when I come up.’

  ‘Doesn’t everyone leave their shoes outside the door?’

  He raised his eyebrows. ‘Are you mistaking this for the bleedin’ Ritz? You must have been confused by the dozens of liveried footmen and scurrying housemaids into thinking this is 1908. Shoes left outside, the idea!’

  ‘Forgive me, it’s my first country-house weekend,’ she said humbly.

  He carried her bag in and dumped it on the bed. ‘There you are, waif. Now, is there anything else you need?’

  She remembered. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘There’s something I need to tell you. Have you got a minute?’

  He saw she was serious. ‘For you, as many as you like. Has something happened?’

  So she told him. At some point they both sat down on the bed, and when she’d finished she found he was holding her hand. He looked shocked.

  ‘This is getting nasty,’ he said. ‘It can’t go on.’

  ‘You don’t think they’d – they’d hurt me, do you? I mean, it wouldn’t go that far?’

  ‘No!’ he said immediately. Then, more slowly. ‘No, I can’t believe that. God, this is Bursford, not Baltimore. I can’t believe it’s happening at all.’

  ‘You said you’d try to get to the bottom of it.’

  He looked chagrined. ‘I’m afraid I haven’t done anything yet. Well, it was just one incident. I thought it was just some stupid thing that wouldn’t happen again.’

  ‘Is there anything you can do?’ she asked, rather despairingly.

  ‘I can ask some questions around the place.’ He thought a moment. ‘You didn’t ring the police?’

  She shrugged. ‘I didn’t think of it. My first idea was to fix the door and get rid of – that thing. So of course I’d spoiled the evidence. And when I did think of it, I didn’t think there’d be any point. I couldn’t imagine they’d send a squad car out from whatever distant place they hang out in, just because someone had broken into an empty house. It’s not as if you could call out the village bobby.’

  ‘You’re probably right,’ Jack said. ‘In any case, it might be better if I try to find something out without involving them. I’d be more likely to get answers than strangers. Leave it with me.’

  ‘I already have, once,’ she said.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I should have taken it more seriously. I’m glad you came here, anyway. You’ll be safe with us for a day or two.’

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ Kate said, and couldn’t help a bit of a wobble in her voice.

  He looked at her. ‘You poor kid! You must have been scared stiff.’

  ‘It wasn’t very nice,’ she said in a small voice.

  He took her in his arms, and she leaned into his nice-smelling, all-male warmth and felt comforted. After a while, he put her back from him a little, looked earnestly into her face, and then somehow they were kissing.

  It was nice; it was so good to be kissing a man again, and Jack was an expert at it, and she did like him so much. It went on, and grew deeper and more urgent. In the end it was she who broke off, aware that the door was open and anyone could pass by; and that she’d assured Ed, and Jack himself, that they were just friends.

  On the other hand, she thought, aware of his hands, one on her back and the other stroking her hair, Ed was fully involved with Addison, and even if Jack’s wife was upstairs she was an ex-wife, wasn’t she, so all was perfectly fair. Why shouldn’t she have some comfort and pleasure like anyone else?

  Jack was breathing hard. ‘We’d better not get carried away. We’re supposed to be dressing for dinner.’ He grinned. ‘Whole weekend before us. Plenty of time for me to act like a photographer, get you in a dark room and see what develops. But for now, I’d better go.’ He kissed the end of her nose, then her lips again, but lightly this time, and stood up. ‘I’m glad you’re here,’ he said seriously.

  ‘I am too,’ she said.

  During the cocktail hour there was a lot of serious drinking, as everyone was staying and could let their hair down for once, not having to worry about driving home. Jocasta and Theo were there, and made a beeline for Kate and, feeling a bit like the au pair, she entertained them and was entertained by them, chatting and playing word games while she drank a glass of wine and they had ginger ale, and all three of them worked through a variety of canapés and nibbles that Jocasta foraged very competently.

  It gave Kate the chance to observe the company from her outpost, which meant, of course, observing Addison. She certainly dominated the room, taller, more beautiful and more magnetic than anyone else in it, looking splendid in a wine-coloured silk dress sewn all over with self-coloured crystal spars so that it glittered when she moved; her hair loose, held back by a matching bandeau.

  She had most of the conversation, too. But although when Kate caught Jack’s eye from time to time he winked and rolled his eyes about her, she was winning favour with everyone else. Camilla was already enslaved – here was someone who could talk designer labels with her from a position of equal if not greater strength. But she kept the other women engaged with talk not only of clothes but of diets and health fads – she knew all the latest American ones – and celebrity gossip. Her voice, though loud, was not grating, and she certainly had plenty to say that people wanted to hear.

  To the men she talked finance and markets, and they were dazzled by her knowledge and authority. It was girl-in-a-City-suit syndrome: a man’s topic coming out of a woman’s mouth had them dribbling with lust. Men were such unreconstructed cavemen, the poppets! And when the conversation turned to country matters, she was able to contribute world cattle and wheat prices, and to reveal with a modest little laugh that she was a crack shot. Her father had taught her, and she had shot mule deer in New Hampshire and reindeer in Alaska. She talked about ranching adventures, camping out in Yellowstone, and a scary encounter with a bear. She even had an amusing tale about how she had shot a burglar in the leg one night, preventing him from escaping until the cops arrived.

  The children left, groaning and dragging their feet, to go up to bed, and soon afterwards dinner was announced and everyone decamped into the dining room, but apart from that nothing much changed. The conversation broke up from time to time into smaller groups, but then would recoagulate into one general topic, always led by Addison. She was
undoubtedly the queen of the evening, and a stranger poking his head in would have assumed she was the mistress of the house and everyone’s hostess. But she dominated with confidence and style, and Kate, looking round the table, thought that everyone was having a good time and would remember the evening as a success.

  The only person she couldn’t read was Ed. He said very little, listening to Addison and giving her his attention, but with his face even more inscrutable than ever. He didn’t smile – though of course he never did – even when she included him in some anecdote: ‘You remember, darling, that funny little man? We couldn’t get rid of him – I think he was just so smitten with me – in the end Edward was forced to fake an emergency call on his mobile – didn’t you, darling? And we literally ran away. It was such a hoot!’

  He nodded or assented to joint memories, but added nothing to them. Even when Addison appealed directly: ‘You tell the story, Edward, you tell it so much better than me,’ he only shook his head and held silent until, inevitably, she took the narrative back herself.

  Kate wanted to see this as less than a wholehearted commitment to the relationship, but it was dangerous to read anything into his behaviour, because she was not an impartial observer. She couldn’t even swear to herself that he was not thoroughly happy, because that was very likely the purest self-delusion.

  The only time she got any evidence for her side was during a long dissertation by Addison on health and diet, which was evidently one of her hobby horses. Kate had noticed that she had eaten very little of the delicious dinner that had been put in front of her. At one point she had said loudly, ‘No salad? Where’s the salad?’ and Ed had said, quite sharply, ‘You know we don’t have a salad course in England.’

  ‘Well, I know that,’ she had said, with something of a pout, ‘but I thought you’d become more civilized, darling, and learned something of our ways.’

  Then she had gone off on how terrible the general diet was in Yurrup, even in France, while in England it was ‘beyond terrible’. Too much fat, too much meat. ‘I mean, look at what we’ve been served this evening,’ she said, as if they were in a restaurant, not someone’s house. ‘Look at your plates! Dripping with artery-clogging saturated fats and animal proteins.’ She went on about free radicals, superoxides and open-shell configurations, gliadin and the difference between sprouted and unsprouted grains, while around the table jaws champed in perpetual motion and forks full of Mrs B’s delicious cooking were raised rhythmically from plate to mouth as the guests listened.

  Finally, Ed interrupted her flow, saying, ‘I’m sorry you’re not enjoying your dinner, but everyone else is, so perhaps we’d better drop the subject.’

  She gave him a look. ‘But when the food you serve is so unhealthy—’

  He interrupted a second time, before she could get going again. ‘On a point of fact, food can’t be healthy or unhealthy. It can be health-giving, nutritional, even therapeutic, but it can’t be healthy.’

  ‘Resorting to pedantics is what people do when they’re losing the argument,’ she said, not angrily, but with the calm of the righteous; but she graciously allowed the subject to change. Kate had been watching Ed the whole time, and now his eyes met hers the length of the table. For a moment their gaze held, and though his expression didn’t noticeably change, she felt there was a pulse of sympathy passing between them. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Addison look towards her, and the next moment she addressed a remark to Ed, and the contact was broken as he turned to reply.

  But, she told herself, if you’re reduced to snatching at crumbs like that, you must be desperate. It’s pitiful to imagine disharmony between lovers just because it would suit you. And, she should remember, he had only interrupted Addison because she was tacitly criticizing his other guests. And he’d only looked at her, Kate, because she was staring at him.

  She gave herself a good shake, banned herself from looking at Ed again the whole evening, and concentrated on enjoying her dinner companions, Jeremy on one side and Greg on the other. Jeremy only wanted to talk about Camilla and Greg only wanted to talk about futures, but she did her best.

  Back in the drawing room, she got into a group including the Brigadier and Jack and Felicity, and everything became more jolly and entertaining. Across the other side of the room, Beth had got Ed cornered in such a way that Addison couldn’t get to him, and although talking about the Milan fashion show to the adoring audience of Camilla and Matty must have been something of a compensation, she kept throwing him frowning glances.

  Jack nudged Kate. ‘Heap big trouble. Pocahontas not like other squaw hang around big chief,’ he murmured wickedly. ‘But Pocahontas just have to suck it up!’

  ‘Jack, behave yourself,’ Flick said sternly. ‘I’m sure she’s a very nice woman.’

  ‘You aren’t,’ he retorted, and she struggled not to laugh.

  ‘At least I’m not enjoying the sight of a fellow mortal who’s fallen into a bear trap,’ she said. ‘Schadenfreude is an unattractive trait.’

  ‘Oh?’ he enquired. ‘And what about when that terrible Pat Withenshaw made an entire speech at the flower show with a blob of mayonnaise on her chin? As I remember, a certain person not a thousand miles from here sniggered in a most inelegant manner.’

  ‘Well, she deserved it, awful woman.’

  ‘That, my love, is the very essence of Schadenfreude. We’re not celebrating the downfall of innocent baby lambs and little helpless kittens here.’

  The exchange was redolent of a long and satisfying relationship, of shared memories and feelings, attitudes and vocabulary. Kate thought Ed was probably right, and that Jack was still stuck on Felicity – and perhaps she was on him. It would be nice for them, probably, if they could get back together.

  It made her feel like an outsider again. But she refused to feel that it would be any loss for her. He was just a friend. And after all, she was not a permanent resident here. She’d soon be gone – sooner than she had planned for, if her mystery enemy made any more attacks.

  The evening showed no signs of breaking up. Everyone was relaxing, drinking and talking as hard as ever when the clock went past twelve. Kate slipped out to the loo, and at the end of the corridor was mobbed by the dogs, who had been banned from the drawing room on Addison’s orders: she didn’t want them jumping up at her, she said, and had earlier complained that they were allowed on the furniture and left their hair everywhere. It did no good for Jocasta to say they weren’t allowed on the furniture, they just did it. It just let them all in for a lecture on proper dog-training, and the various diseases humans could catch from contact with their pets.

  She comforted the dogs now, and they rolled their eyes up at her mournfully when she told them she hadn’t come with a reprieve. On her way back, she met Addison just outside the drawing room door, and had an odd feeling that she had been waiting for her.

  ‘Ah, there you are,’ Addison said. ‘I thought you’d gone off to bed.’

  ‘No, I’m just getting my second wind,’ Kate said, looking up into that carved, beautiful face, whose perfection of make-up was unsmudged even this late in the evening.

  ‘Are you having a nice time, sweetie?’ Addison asked.

  Kate thought it was an odd thing for her to ask, since she was a guest too: it was a question the hostess might ask. While she was pondering this, and wondering what to say, Addison went on. ‘There’s something I want to talk to you about.’

  Annoyingly, Kate felt herself blush as her imagination jumped ahead and pictured Addison saying, Edward is mine, kid, so back off. Don’t even think about him.

  ‘This point-to-point race on Monday,’ she went on. ‘I know you were planning to ride the mare – what’s her name?’

  ‘Henna,’ Kate said woodenly. She had a horrid premonition about this.

  ‘Henna, that’s right. But I’m much the more experienced rider, and Edward would really like me to ride her instead.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Kate.

  ‘I kn
ow you’ve been practising, but I’m sure you won’t mind stepping aside and letting me take her over, when it’s what Edward wants.’

  ‘Well, no – I mean—’

  ‘You’re not too disappointed? That’s good. Because, frankly, he doesn’t really think you’re up to it, and the mare deserves a chance, don’t you think?’

  Through wooden lips, Kate said, ‘It’s whatever Ed wants. He’s the boss.’

  ‘Yes, he is, isn’t he?’ Addison said with a complacent smile. ‘Good girl. I’ll tell him you agree. Now, do you know where the bathroom is?’

  ‘Straight down there, left at the end, and it’s on the left,’ Kate said mechanically, and Addison swept away, leaving Kate to enjoy her humiliation in peace.

  Nineteen

  Camilla told everyone when they began to drift up to bed that, after such late night carousals, breakfast would be at ten, and if anyone wanted to go to church, morning service was at eleven.

  Kate could not be said to sleep well. The mattress was old, and so lumpy it was a question of avoiding the worst peaks and fitting herself into the valleys, which meant there were only one or at best two positions she could lie in without damaging herself. And of course, if you feel you can’t move, that becomes the one thing you desperately want to do.

  She dropped off at last into an uneasy sleep full of dreams that were not exactly nightmares but still very hard work. She mustn’t have latched her door securely, for early in the morning it was pushed open by Ralph, who jumped up on the bed, closely followed by Toby. Both curled up on her feet with sighs of satisfaction. She was at that point of half-waking when you can’t make yourself wake enough to do anything, and she dozed fitfully after that, much too hot with an extra covering of two dogs, until early in the morning they both suddenly deserted her, presumably having heard someone stirring below.

  There was not a full complement of guests at breakfast when she got down. The Brigadier had gone for a long walk with Eric Orde, Jocasta was out riding, and Greg and Sasha weren’t down yet. Theo was at the table, brightly tackling a boiled egg, with Flick on one side of him and Jack on the other, a little cameo of family content that made Kate smile inwardly.