Snare of Serpents

by Виктория Холт

  It was a largish house, grey stone like the church; before it was a well-kept lawn with flower beds surrounding it. And there at the door was a man whom I knew at once was Lilias’ father—and with him a woman, clearly sister Jane.

  They came towards us as Lilias brought the dogcart to a halt.

  “Here we are,” cried Lilias. “The train was on time, for once. This is … Diana.”

  My hands were clasped in a firm grip and I was looking into the smiling, benign face of the Reverend George Milne.

  “Welcome, welcome, my dear,” he said. “We are so pleased that you have come. Lilias has been so happy since you said you would.”

  “And this is Jane,” said Lilias.

  Jane was rather like Lilias and I knew I was going to like her for that reason alone.

  Her greeting was as warm as that of her father had been. I said how glad I was to meet them and what a peaceful spot it was. The flowers were lovely.

  “You’ve won Jane’s heart,” said Lilias. “She has an obsession with the garden.”

  “It’s a good thing that I have,” retorted Jane. “Someone has to do it. It would be like a wilderness left to you. Come along in. I expect you’re hungry. Dinner’s almost ready. We hoped the train wasn’t going to be late and took a chance on that. So … in half an hour? Lilias can show you to your room and Daisy will bring up some hot water.”

  “Thank you. That would be lovely,” I said. “One gets grimy travelling.”

  I felt at home immediately. I had slipped into a new role. I must get accustomed to my new name, and when I had I should be able to believe I really had stepped away from the past.

  We went into a hall. I noticed the highly polished furniture; on a hall table was a large bowl of flowers, colours exquisitely blended and beautifully arranged.

  Lilias noticed my glance. “That’s Jane,” she said. “She fills the house with flowers.”

  “They are so lovely,” I said. “Oh, Lilias … I am going to be happy here.”

  “We are going to do our best to make you,” replied Lilias.

  I followed her up the staircase to a landing.

  “We’ve put you on the first floor,” said Lilias. “You have to mind your head when you enter some of these rooms. I think people must have been smaller at the time places like this were built.” She opened the door of a room and I followed her in. It was large but rather dark and there was only one window and that was leaded. There was a bed in one corner, and a dressing table and a mirror and a wash hand stand. A large cupboard almost filled one wall.

  “There you are,” she said. “I’m afraid it’s not like your home in Edinburgh, but …”

  “It’s lovely,” I said, “and I can’t tell you how happy I am to be here with you … and your family.”

  I went to the window. I was looking over the graveyard. I had a view of the tottering gravestones, the ancient yews and cypress trees. It was fascinating.

  Lilias came and stood beside me. “I hope you don’t think it’s a little morbid? I chose this room for you because it is a little bigger than the other spares and the graveyard has a kind of friendly feeling when you get to know it. At least, that’s what my sister Emma used to say. She’s married now, you know. I have a niece and nephew through her and two nephews through Grace who married a clergyman. Emma used to say that if there were ghosts they were nice ones.”

  At that point the door was opened by a middle-aged woman who came in carrying a can of hot water. Lilias introduced her as Daisy.

  “It’s nice to see ‘ee, Miss,” she said to me. “I hope you’ll enjoy your stay.”

  “We’re going to make sure of that, Daisy,” Lilias told her.

  “That we be,” said Daisy.

  “Thank you,” I murmured.

  When she had gone Lilias said: “Daisy has been with us all our lives. She came when my father and mother were married and this is her home as it is ours. We just have a girl coming in some mornings to help with the cleaning. Jane is an excellent housekeeper though. Otherwise I don’t know how we’d manage. I’m rather a poor replacement for Alice.”

  I remembered that Alice was the sister who had left the household to become a governess when Lilias had been forced to return home.

  “No,” went on Lilias, “I’m not much of a help in the house. My father calls Jane and me his Mary and Martha.”

  “I daresay you have your uses.”

  “I shop and help with the local good works … bazaars and so on … everything that goes with the routine of a country vicarage.”

  “Which is very important, I’ve no doubt.”

  “Well, I suppose I could say I am of some use.”

  “What strikes me so forcibly about the place is the peace of it.”

  “I’m glad you find it so. It’s what you need.”

  “Oh, how I wish that I had come in different circumstances! But it’s no use wishing you can change what’s gone before.”

  “No good at all. But it is going to get better. We’re going to put the past behind us. We both have to do that. We’re just going to forget it all happened. It’s the only way.”

  “But can we?”

  “We can try. Now, I am going to leave you to wash and change if you want to. Can you find your way down?”

  “I’m sure I can.”

  She was gone and I was alone. I washed and changed. I felt elated. I knew I had been right to come here.

  As THE DAYS PASSED I became more sure of this. I had slipped into a new identity and was no longer startled when I heard myself addressed as Diana. I was caught up in a new way of life. I was becoming very friendly with Jane who was quite different from Lilias. Jane was no dreamer; she was practical in the extreme which was very necessary in running the vicarage household on what I imagined was by no means a large stipend.

  I wanted to contribute to the household expenses, but my hints that I should do so were so firmly brushed aside that it was difficult to pursue the matter. Jane and Daisy put their heads together so skillfully that there was no sign of any deprivation. Meals were simple but wholesome. Daisy had taught Jane to cook long ago and she had taken to it, as Daisy said, like a fish to water.

  Lilias lacked an interest in domestic affairs. She and Alice had been “the clever ones.” Alice was now making use of her skills while alas Lilias, because of that unfortunate incident, was unable to do so.

  The vicar was very much as I had expected him to be, due to Lilias’ description. He was one of the most contented people I had ever met. He was completely unselfish and his life seemed to have been given over to the service of others. He was a little absent-minded, but between his daughters and Daisy he was taken good care of. He was greatly loved by all with whom he came into contact and his little foibles were looked upon with the greatest indulgence. He was indeed a very happy man. I thought how lucky Lilias was to be his daughter, which sent my thoughts back to my own father; I recalled his anger over my friendship with Jamie and his outraged dismissal of Kitty and how Zillah had crept into his bedroom at night.

  But I must not think of my father—nor of Jamie. Jamie had failed me. His love had not been strong enough to stand up to trouble and at the first sign of it he had crept away.

  That had hurt me deeply. But I supposed it was the terrible nature of what had followed which had helped to subdue the bitterness of that particular blow.

  On my first day I heard that Major Jennings, who ran the riding stables, was a great friend of the vicarage family. He knew that Lilias liked to ride and could not afford to, so he had asked her if, as a favour to him, she would help with the exercising of his horses. Lilias had accepted the offer with the greatest alacrity. Therefore she rode a good deal.

  “I go over to help with the grooming and clean out the stables,” she said. “I enjoy being with horses. Sometimes, if they are hard-pressed I give people lessons. It’s a wonderful opportunity. How would you like to ride?”

  “I’m not a rider, but I did have a few
lessons in Scotland, so I’m not exactly a novice.”

  “Well, here’s your opportunity.”

  “What a good idea! I could pay for my lessons and you, Lilias, could teach me.”

  Lilias looked disturbed, so I explained hastily: “It’s all right. My father left me some money. I have a small income so I am not exactly poor. The house and the bulk of his fortune went to Zillah.”

  Lilias was thoughtful: “It all happened so quickly. It seems odd. It’s not so very long since I was there. She came … and almost immediately she married your father. It’s almost as though it were arranged.” She hesitated, staring into space. “I’m talking nonsense,” she went on. “Let’s go to the Jennings’ this morning and see what can be arranged about the riding. You’ll like them. Besides the major there are Mrs. Jennings and Florence, their daughter. They all work with the horses.”

  “Tell me about the other neighbours.”

  “Well, there’s the manor.”

  “I remember your telling me about that. It’s where the squire lives … and the young man you were going to marry.”

  “Yes. Charles … Charles Merrimen.”

  “Is he still there?”

  “Oh yes, he’s there. I go and see him quite often. He’s in a wheelchair most of the time. He’s such a fine man.”

  “Shall I meet him?”

  “Of course. And then there are the Ellingtons at Lakemere House. They are the important family here. They are the rich ones, the benefactors of the village. It was to them that Kitty went. Oh! I’d forgotten Kitty. Just in case you meet her she’ll have to be prepared, won’t she? We don’t want her blurting out …”

  It was as though a cloud had settled about us. The euphoria was slipping away. Was it always going to be like that? Should I constantly be wondering whether someone was going to recognise me?

  Nanny Grant’s voice came back to me over the years:

  Oh, what a tangled web we weave When first we practise to deceive.

  NEVERTHELESS the harmony of the vicarage was bringing back to me a sense of security. I would wake with a feeling of anticipation, wondering what the day would bring.

  I would stand by the window looking out over the graveyard. Those ancient tombstones might have looked eerie in moonlight, but somehow they conveyed a sense of peace; the troubles of those who lay beneath them were over. Friendly ghosts indeed.

  Lilias’ company had a further healing effect. I could open my heart to her; and how good it was to share my troubled thoughts! I could tell her how hurt I had been by Jamie’s desertion.

  “It was just as well,” was her verdict. “If he failed you when you most needed him, he would not have been the partner with whom you could have gone happily through life. He might have cared for you … a little; but he cared more for himself. Better not to marry than marry the wrong one. You were young, inexperienced and lonely; you had lost your mother; you and I had parted; your father had remarried and you were not sure of your stepmother. I believe you were ready to fall in love. In love with love, as they say. And that’s not so hard to get over as the real thing.”

  Yes, she was indeed comforting.

  Then there was the riding. Major Jennings was a hearty middle-aged man, bronzed through service in India; when he came home he had settled down to run his stables with the help of his wife and daughter. Both Mrs. and Miss Jennings were brisk and jolly people; they were surrounded by dogs—four at least, but they were large and intrusive and made their presence felt.

  The first time I met the family we were taken into a comfortable but rather shabby room, on the walls of which hung several pictures of horses, and given tea by Mrs. Jennings. Miss Florence Jennings came in while we were having it. She was a tall young woman of about thirty, I imagine, with abundant reddish hair and a crop of freckles. She was in a riding habit. I was to discover that she spent most of her days garbed thus.

  “This is Florence, my daughter,” said Mrs. Jennings. “Horses are a passion with us, and Florence, if anything, is more besotted than the rest of us over the four-legged darlings, aren’t you, Flo?”

  Florence admitted that she was.

  There were a great many brass and carved wooden ornaments in the room as well as two Benares tables—all obviously from India. They seemed to have brought a flavour of that country into their home.

  The dogs came in to inspect us, one fawning, one curious and the other two inclined to be suspicious.

  “That’s enough, Tiffin. You, too, Rajah. These are good friends.”

  The dogs immediately drew back at the sound of the voice of authority.

  Both Mrs. Jennings and Florence were interested to hear that I intended to ride and so far had only had a few lessons.

  “You’ll soon be a rider,” Florence assured me. “I sense it. Long practise, you know. Don’t let your mount know you’re nervous. That’s when they play up. Let them know you’re in charge … right from the start. Pet them a little, and they are yours.”

  Lilias said she thought it would be a good idea if she gave the lessons, at which Mrs. Jennings slapped her thigh and said that would be just the ticket.

  The outcome was that I was instructed by Lilias and after three or four days of discomfort, I was well on the way to becoming a horsewoman.

  Lilias took me to the manor and there I met Charles Merrimen. I liked him from the beginning. There was something almost saintly in his acceptance of his disability and there was clearly a bond of deep affection between him and Lilias. His father, the squire, was a rather taciturn and dignified man and the family had lived in the manor for centuries. There were Charles’ elder brother David, his wife and two sons, but it was Charles who was of special interest to me for he might so easily have married Lilias and then she and I would never have met. That made me ponder on the strangeness of chance.

  I accompanied her on one or two occasions when she visited him, but I quickly began to feel that those meetings should be for the two of them alone. She told me that she was reading Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire aloud to him and he enjoyed it so much. So I excused myself and, as Lilias and I had always understood each other, she accepted my decision not to go with her.

  Then came the invitation from Lakemere House.

  “Mrs. Ellington regards herself as lady of the manor,” Lilias explained. “I think she feels that the Merrimens are rather lax in carrying out their duties. Well, the squire is getting on, David is quite absorbed in his family and Charles, of course, can do nothing. Mrs. Ellington is very efficient, of course. She is one of those women who thinks she knows what is good for people better than they do themselves. The maddening thing is that she often does. We are invited to tea. If she approves of you you will be invited again. By the way, we shall have to do something about Kitty before we go there … just in case we run into her. I wonder if I could get her over here for some reason? Let’s see. I’ll ask Jane. She might have some ideas.”

  Jane did.

  “I heard Father say that she has never been confirmed. She wants to be and, of course, Mrs. Ellington is all for it. Get her over here on the pretext of discussing that.”

  The message was sent and on the day before we were due to visit Lakemere House Kitty arrived. We arranged that I should keep out of sight until Lilias had talked to her.

  I had a glimpse of her from my window as she arrived. She looked plumper and more contented. I thought: the life here suits her.

  She had not been in the house long when Daisy came to my room and told me that Lilias thought I should now go down to the drawing room.

  When I arrived Kitty ran to me and threw her arms about me. Then she withdrew—a little shocked, I think, at her temerity.

  I kissed her cheek and said: “It’s good to see you, Kitty.”

  “Oh, Miss D … er, Miss er … It was terrible … the things they said …”

  “It’s over,” I said. “We try to forget it.”

  She nodded. “But I’ll never forget what you d
one for me, Miss … you and Miss Milne. I just don’t know what I would have done without you.”

  “So you’re happy at Lakemere House?”

  “Oh yes. It’s nice. I really like it there.”

  “I hope it will stay like that.”

  “You mustn’t forget that it is Miss Diana now,” said Lilias. “Miss Diana Grey. It is important, Kitty, that you should not forget.”

  “Oh, I won’t, Miss.”

  She told us how different from Edinburgh it was living in Lakemere House. She had made friends and Mrs. Ellington took an interest. She knew she had done wrong, but she couldn’t think what had come over her. It was just that … She blushed and we changed the subject.

  Lilias hustled her off to the vicar that the subject of her confirmation might be broached. Lilias was a stickler for the truth and she wanted to adhere to it as much as possible.

  I could not help feeling a little apprehensive when we drove over to Lakemere House in the dogcart, even though I tried to repress my fear and assure myself that I must not feel so nervous every time I was going to meet someone new.

  Lilias was saying: “As she regards herself as the guardian of the village, Mrs. Ellington likes to know everything that is going on. She is especially interested in the church. I think she believes it is her duty to watch over my father. She respects his goodness, but deplores his unpractical way of going about life. She regards him with a mixture of affection and exasperation. She admires his Christian virtues and despairs of his unworldliness. I daresay she will try to get you to give a hand in village affairs while you are here.”

  “I shan’t mind that. Is there a Mr. Ellington?”

  “Oh yes. He’s very rich. He goes back and forth to Exeter and is often in London. He never interferes with Mrs. Ellington’s affairs—he just supplies the comforts which enable her to continue with her good works. He is said to be a lion in business and a lamb in the domestic circle.”

  “So Mrs. Ellington is the resident lioness.”