Songbird

by Bell, Julia

  I had decided to wear my sleeveless, silver-grey silk with a low neckline, my hair tied up with pink rosebuds. And when it was time to get ready, I felt myself trembling. I felt unbelievably happy. Before I entered the ballroom, I smoothed out the silk material of my dress and fussed with the rosebuds, wanting to look my best.

  The ballroom was crowded, the hum of conversation echoing off the walls. The chandeliers seemed like brilliant stars in a fruitful heaven, illuminating the guests in their finery. The French windows had been left open to allow in a cool breeze and outside, lamps flickered along the veranda and lawn allowing the guests to walk outside as the temperature in the room increased. Brett was talking with the guests and he looked in my direction and smiled.

  The orchestra started up and the dancing was underway. I seemed to dance with every man in the room, including Brett, who held me too tightly and I had to whisper that people would notice. Then came the wonderful buffet, toasts to Lady Shelbrook and her quiet response, before the dancing restarted.

  Lord Waltham eventually asked me to dance. “I believe your tour is ended now. Have you thought what you might do next?”

  “I haven’t decided.”

  “And you’re the famous opera singer Emmeline Barri? I think you were having fun at my expense that morning at Claythorpe when I spoke profusely of your talent.”

  I grimaced. “Yes and I’m sorry about that but I wanted to keep it a secret. Just for a short while I wanted to be Mrs Isabelle Asquith and forget about singing.”

  His lordship smiled.

  The dance came to an end and Danny came running to my side, with Emily and Abigail hot on his heels.

  “Mama, Emily’s papa wants you to sing. Come on.”

  Before I could protest, they pulled me over to the orchestra where the conductor was waiting, his expression puzzled.

  “I’m not quite sure I understand, Miss Barri, but Lord Shelbrook is offering one shilling and sixpence if you’ll sing.”

  I looked across to where Brett stood watching. “Then I’d better take it,” I giggled. “But what shall I sing?”

  “That one from Mr Sullivan’s opera. The one that we used to dance round and round to in the hotel room,” said Danny, his eyes sparkling with enthusiasm.

  I thought for a moment and nodded at the conductor. “He means the one from The Gondoliers. It’s supposed to be sung by the chorus, but I improvised.”

  The conductor laughed. “Do you mean Dance a Cachuca, Fandango, Bolero?”

  I nodded. “Silly, isn’t it.”

  “No, indeed, ma’am. We can certainly play it.” Everyone had started to gather round and I saw Brett step closer, his arms folded, a grin spreading across his face. I smiled at him. The conductor turned to the guests. “Miss Barri is going to sing an improvised version of Dance a Cachuca, Fandango, Bolero from Mr Sullivan and Mr Gilbert’s The Gondoliers.”

  There was a murmur of approval as I took his hand and stepped up beside him. I faced the multitude of people in the ballroom.

  “But it is a dance. So please, keep on dancing,” I said. Everyone took their partners.

  Standing two feet above them, I gathered the material of my gown in both my hands and gently twirled from side to side with the rhythm. It was a very happy, bouncy tune and as I sang the dancers skipped round the room in a polka, the only dance that suited the beat. I tried not to laugh as Danny danced with both Emily and Abigail, or meet Brett’s gaze as he watched me, his expression soft, his feelings apparent for all to see. Angelique was sitting on a couch talking to Lady Waltham and turned her head to smile at me.

  I just caught a glimpse of a figure standing to one side of the windows, before I heard an explosion and I was flying sideways through the air to land with a thud on the floor. A burning sensation swept through my shoulder and then a violent pain that made me gasp and then cry out. Blood poured from a gaping wound and I covered the torn flesh with my hand, trying to stem the flow. I kept quite still, unable to move, my lips parted sucking in great gulps of air, trying to force away the pain that was making breathing difficult. I closed my eyes and slipped briefly into a void of darkness, before I opened them again and became aware of the shrieks of fright from the guests and of Brett kneeling beside me, his face creased in a frown. His lips were moving but I couldn’t make out what he was saying. Gwilym’s concerned expression hovered into view before I sank into oblivion.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  I remember little of the following days, except the pain and figures fading mistily in and out of my vision. And then came the day, whether it was morning or afternoon I had no idea, when I opened my eyes and felt at peace. I stared about and almost believed my spirit could lift from my body and float around the room. It was an amusing notion until I realised I must be dying. Yes, this peculiar sensation was because I was about to make my last journey. I was going to meet Papa and Mama again and my darling husband. And I would have to answer for my sins. This worried me and I knew that I had to do one thing before I left and that was to tell Brett that Angelique was ill and he must look after her and never leave her. I turned my head just as he entered the room and I raised my hand. He came to sit on the mattress.

  “You’re finally with us,” he smiled. “Your brother did an amazing job removing…” He stopped abruptly as I tried to speak. “No, don’t tire yourself. You must rest.”

  I would have none of it and insisted. He bent low over my face listening intently as I whispered the secret that I had sworn to keep but now couldn’t. And when I was finished I closed my eyes and sank into a deep sleep.

  But I did get better and as each day passed I was able to do more. Sitting up was wonderful. I still felt weak and needed help to eat and drink and I slept a great deal of the time. Eventually I became more aware of my surroundings. A large dressing covered most of my left shoulder although I hadn’t been told what had happened to me. The day finally came when I wanted to rise from my bed. I struggled to my feet, but then fell to my knees.

  The door opened and a maid came in carrying a tray. Brett followed at her elbow, but was at my side in a moment, picking me up in his arms. The maid placed the tray on the table, plumped up the pillows and straightened the covers ready for my poor aching body.

  “Now, you shouldn’t be up and about just yet,” said Brett, smiling.

  “I must get up. I want to move around.”

  He chuckled. “Your brother said you’d want to be up and about very soon.” He carried me back to bed and helped me in, tucking the covers round me. “Do you remember what happened at Angelique’s party?”

  I stared up at him and then all the horror returned to me. “Angelique’s party! I was singing…and then there was that terrible pain.”

  Brett nodded. “Well, that pain came from a bullet when it struck your shoulder.”

  The maid flipped out the small legs on the tray and placed it across my lap and then poured out a cup of tea and handed it to me.

  I sipped my drink. “I want to know everything. Who shot me? Who would want to?”

  His expression was dark and I knew he was struggling with how much he should tell me.

  “Well, someone certainly had that intention. But he’s been caught. In fact, he was caught immediately and is now in custody.”

  “Who was it?”

  “Your manager, Mr Andrew Perry.”

  Danny came to see me the following day after the maid had helped me bathe and change into a fresh nightgown. We spent a wonderful hour together and he clung to me hardly believing that I was sitting up and able to pay attention.

  “You’ve been asleep for such a long time, Mama. I was so worried you might not wake up.”

  I stroked his face. “I would never leave you, dearest. Besides I have to get better to see you in your play at Christmas.”

  “May Emily and Abigail come in?” he asked quietly.

  “Yes, of course. I want to see them.”

  Everyone came to see me over the next two days and Gwilym w
as the best doctor any patient could have. He explained that the bullet had penetrated my shoulder and he had had to perform surgery to remove it. Infection was the main worry but the wound was clean and healing well.

  When Diamond came to see me, I held her hand tightly. “How could Andrew do that to me?” I shook my head in bewilderment. “To want me dead is bad enough but he discharged a weapon in a crowded room. He could have hit anyone, even one of the children.”

  “He hasn’t said much since his arrest. Only that it was revenge.”

  “Revenge?”

  She nodded. “You must have hurt him terribly when you turned down his proposal of marriage.”

  But I knew there was more to it than a simple rejection.

  My health improved until I was able to sit by the window and watch the gardeners weeding and cutting back the roses. Sometimes I saw the children running to the meadow and often I would see Gwilym or Diamond walking along the path. Visitors were constant and Angelique often came to sit with me.

  One day, about ten days after the shooting, I was sitting by the window, my dressing gown wrapped warmly round me, when Emily burst into the room with her father close behind.

  She hung her arms round my neck. “Mama,” she said, her eyelashes glistening with tears.

  I held her close and looked at Brett who nodded. “Angelique and I decided it was time she knew.”

  “But I won’t tell anyone else,” she whispered. “You’re a very important person and I don’t want people to talk about you.”

  I smiled and held her close.

  Brett narrowed his eyes. “I’ve also been discussing health matters with my wife and it seems I now know the truth.”

  I grimaced at my betrayal. “I shouldn’t have told you.”

  “Angelique has agreed it was a foolish thing to hide her illness from me. She bears you no animosity.”

  Emily nodded. “Her heart is broken, so we must take good care of her.”

  I arrived home at the beginning of November when it was starting to turn chilly. Gwilym accompanied me and in fact, he had travelled between the capital and Wiltshire looking after his wife and sister in turn. Nan was at the window, waiting for the cab to pull up outside the front door and when it did, everyone spilled out onto the pavement to greet us. Seeing Ruth again was unbelievable, her small build huge now that she was days away from delivering her baby. I already knew that Diamond and Victor had postponed their wedding until January until after the birth and also allowing me to recover completely.

  That evening everyone was full of the news of Andrew Perry and his attempt on my life.

  “Good thing he didn’t succeed,” said Gwilym grimly. “Not only would Danny have lost his mother and I a sister, but also he would be facing the gallows.”

  I shuddered at the thought.

  “We’ll have to attend his trial, of course,” said Diamond. “But how did he get his hands on a revolver?”

  I nodded. “I was told it was one his father used in the Crimea.” I paused before adding, “I’d like to speak in his defence. I’m partially to blame for what he did.”

  Everyone stared at me.

  Diamond scoffed. “No, you’re not. Simply because you wouldn’t marry him. That’s preposterous.”

  “I must give him something of a character and tell the jury that he’s not an evil person at heart.”

  “It’s up to you but I wouldn’t,” said Diamond and turned her face away.

  I smiled at the others in the room and knew that although puzzled they would understand.

  Three days after returning home, I visited Andrew in Pentonville. He looked drawn and older, his prison clothes hanging on his slender frame. My heart melted at the sight of him even though at first he didn’t seem to want to look me in the eye. But when I told him that I would speak for him in court he turned to stare at me in bewilderment.

  He cleared his throat. “That’s good of you but you don’t need to do that.”

  “I want to do it,” I nodded.

  I looked round the bleak room with high, narrow and barred windows. A partition segregated visitor from prisoner and only an iron grill, hardly a foot square, allowed us to communicate. On Andrew’s side of the partition I noticed a prison guard standing against the wall, watching us.

  “Why?” He shuffled in his chair and I heard the clank of chains. Horror swept through me as I realised his ankles must be manacled.

  I tried to keep my emotions under control. “It was my fault that you turned against me. I don’t understand why that led to your wanting me dead, only you know that.”

  “The doctors say I suffered a nervous collapse and that I didn’t know my own mind.”

  “And what do you think?”

  He grimaced. “Perhaps it was a nervous collapse. All I know is that I felt an intense hatred for you and that’s why I sent the letter.”

  “You threatened me in that letter.” My voice was thick as I thought of dark desires, ghastly deeds and madness. The sinister elements of Macbeth that Brett and I had spoken of at our first luncheon.

  “But I didn’t intend taking your life. I meant that you wouldn’t sing professionally again. I was going to ruin your career.”

  “What changed your mind and made you decide…to end my life?”

  He passed a weary hand across his face. “The realisation that singing or not you would still be with Lord Shelbrook. I couldn’t bear the thought.”

  “Even so, I will stand up in court and speak for you.”

  “They’ll say you’re breaking all the rules.”

  “Rules are meant to be broken,” I smiled.

  EPILOGUE

  Captain Daniel Asquith led his men over the top on the first day of July 1916. I had been told that the thunder of the artillery could be heard in Kent, but I knew that the Somme offensive was a major turning point in a war that had already lasted two years and wasted more lives than could be imagined.

  Our life before the Great War had been idyllic. Angelique survived another three years before passing away peacefully in her sleep in the same year I was invited to Buckingham Palace to sing for Queen Victoria when she celebrated her Diamond Jubilee. The year after in July 1898 Brett and I married and I became Viscountess Shelbrook. We moved between Standford Park and our townhouse in Gibson Place either rearing our Arabian horses or visiting friends and family as often as we could.

  Ruth became the mother of two boys, Huw and Oliver and Diamond and Victor reared a family of three girls named, Ruby, Pearl and Sapphire, much to my amusement. Nan never married but the House of Asquith became a great success and her fashion shows in London, Paris and Milan were much acclaimed. Miss Rupp also never married and continued teaching, eventually joining Mrs Pankhurst in the Suffragette Movement.

  Andrew was sentenced to ten years in Pentonville and paroled after seven for good behaviour. I wasn’t surprised when he married Martha, who had been a constant visitor to the prison and the day they sailed for a new life in America I wished them well.

  We didn’t hear from Jane until just before the war when she turned up on our doorstep desperately ill with consumption. Filled with remorse, she told us she had left our employ after becoming pregnant; the father of her child not only abandoning her but also absconding with her inheritance from Mrs Holland. Sadly, she had resorted to blackmailing Andrew as her only means of support. After losing the baby, she had drifted into various low-paid jobs, until finally the workhouse beckoned. In dire need she had knocked on the door of number fifteen Gibson Place and we were happy to take her in. Twelve months later she died in my arms.

  Emily became the youngest student at The Royal Academy of Music and had a successful career in opera as the first lady of Covent Garden and the darling of London. We attended her opening night in Madam Butterfly when she played the fifteen-year-old geisha and I couldn’t have felt prouder.

  I went back to teaching music, but not as before. I became a tutor at the academy and taught students who had enthusias
m and ambition. And every year I sat on the panel of assessors, always with a lump in my throat as I listened to the young hopefuls.

  We believed our happy life would continue into the new century especially with Emily’s marriage in 1909 and the two grandsons and the granddaughter she gave Brett and me. In his elder grandson, Brett now had an heir to the title and estates of Viscount Shelbrook. But the outbreak of hostilities in 1914 brought a halt to our peaceful lives.

  I spent my time travelling to the different theatres where I performed concerts to raise money for the war effort. It was touching to sing tunes such as It’s a Long Way to Tipperary and Keep the Home Fires Burning, but the clapping and cheering from the many uniformed young men who made up the audience, lessened the sadness, the worry for my own son and two nephews.

  But sorrow came in 1915 when a telegram arrived to say that Huw, the child Ruth had been expecting that eventful year, had been killed in action at Gallipoli just a month before his twenty-first birthday.

  Danny had survived many of the earlier battles, but when he went missing that first day of the Somme and didn’t turn up either with his unit or at a dressing station, Abigail decided to take matters into her own hands. Ordering two stretcher-bearers to follow her, she made her way onto No Man’s Land and eventually found him in a shell hole, his left leg blown off from the knee. She brought him back to safety and as a nursing sister, nursed him back to health. I was more than grateful to her, but as she said afterwards, Danny was her husband and she would never let her two children become fatherless if she could prevent it.

  When Armistice finally came in November 1918, we were relieved but relief was short-lived when Spanish Influenza spread across the country. Diamond was the first to be taken from us and only three months later, Gwilym fell ill and died. His devotion to his stricken patients and the exhausting hours he worked eventually took their toll.