The Winter Secret

by Lulu Taylor

  Agnieska put her head around the door of the drawing room. ‘I go now.’

  ‘Yes.’ Xenia looked over at her. ‘Thank you.’

  Agnieska nodded and slipped away to put on her outdoor shoes. Xenia followed her into the hall.

  ‘Are you cycling today?’ She looked out into the chill grey of the late October afternoon. It was raining again, and the sky was low, full of heavy, iron-coloured clouds. The lane outside was muddy, the potholes full of water the colour of strong tea.

  ‘Yes.’ Agnieska was pulling on her coat.

  ‘Don’t you drive in this weather?’

  ‘I have no car.’ She spoke in her customary uninflected way. It was neither good nor bad that she had no car. Just a fact.

  ‘Where do you live?’

  ‘Galston.’

  ‘Oh.’ The town five miles away: a pedestrianised shopping mall of concrete and high street shops, ringed by industrial estates; a hodge-podge of housing: modern estates, crumbling old terraces, a few streets lined by gracious Edwardian villas with large gardens. She could guess that Agnieska would live on one of the estates, in a house with narrow doorways and low ceilings, all the rooms just a little too small to be properly furnished, so they always felt crowded. ‘And where do your children go to school?’

  ‘Elmhurst Primary. Two miles from the house, but it is a good school.’

  ‘You all walk there every day?’

  ‘Yes, or on the bus.’ She shrugged. ‘It’s fine.’

  ‘If you say so.’

  Agnieska turned to the door. ‘I go. I have the other job.’ She turned back and said, ‘Money?’

  ‘Oh, yes. Here it is.’ Xenia handed over the wages and watched as Agnieska pocketed it, pulled up her hood and went out, skipping down the front steps to where her bike rested under the lean-to. She wheeled it out through the gate and turned left, heading back up the lane towards Charcombe Park.

  Xenia leaned out a little further into the porch and watched as she walked up the lane and then over the road and into the driveway of Fitzroy House.

  Ah. She’s working for the other wife too, is she? I didn’t know that.

  That afternoon, Xenia walked to the churchyard to visit Mama’s grave, as she did every week, to lay something from the garden below the carved wooden cross that marked her resting place. Usually she cleared away whatever she had left there the week before. Sometimes she found a wreath or a bouquet left by an admirer who had made a pilgrimage to visit Natalie Rowe. Occasionally the cross was draped in velvet or with a rope of pretend pearls, or a photograph of Delilah was pinned to it. Xenia always removed those things, so that the cross could be seen properly; it was very beautiful, carved with delicate emblems of flowers: roses, lilies, daisies and daffodils. Mama had loved to gather them when they were in bloom around the house. The cross meant a great deal to Xenia. When news of her mother’s death had become public, she had received many letters. Most of them had been fan letters but one had stood out, addressed to her in swirling calligraphy. It was from Luke Ashley, asking if he could make a cross for Mama’s grave in memory of the years he and his family had spent living at Charcombe, and Xenia had gratefully accepted. Luke had come to deliver it himself – Gwen, he told her, was too ill to travel – and brought his boy with him, though he’d been much older by then.

  ‘We loved your mother,’ Luke had said, and she’d known he meant it. Mama had been more than Natalie Rowe to them, more than Delilah. She’d been real, no matter how troubled and broken she was, and they loved her anyway. The fans only wanted to know about the glamorous young woman with her exquisite face and incredible talent. When all that was over and gone, they had melted away.

  Xenia stood in front of Luke’s cross in its quiet corner of the cemetery. Below Mama’s name was carved her year of birth and of death, each letter and number perfectly formed. Looking at them, she remembered Luke in his workshop, with his chisels and hammers and carving tools, creating beauty out of plain blocks of wood. He had been talented, there was no doubt about that, and Gwen too. She had painted exquisite botanical oils in miniature, on tiny pieces of china and glass or minute stretched canvases. The two of them had brought something special and unexpected to the house, something that she had in the end been grateful for, no matter how much she had disliked the whole idea of strangers living at Charcombe to start with.

  A gust of bitter wind blew under Xenia’s scarf and made her shiver. She laid down the berry-laden branch from the shrub in the garden, placing it carefully on the ground under Mama’s cross, and then went into the church to escape the cold before she walked home again. It was not a Catholic church, but it was all she had, and she still savoured the aroma of old candle wax and the musty, dampish smell of the ancient stone and hymn books.

  Where are Luke and Gwen now? Are they dead?

  For years, to pay the bills, she had leased bits of Charcombe to people who wanted it. The park was grazed by sheep and cattle, the garages housing a few old wrecks and stored possessions. One day, a tall, thin man with wild brown hair, wearing jeans and a loose purple shirt, had driven up to the house in an old VW to suggest a plan. He had an idea that he would run a residential artists’ collective at the house, to teach young people artisan skills that were in danger of being forgotten. Skills like carving, gilding, carpentry and silk-screen painting. He would live at Charcombe with his wife Gwen and their children, while the young people would come and go.

  The idea had not appealed to Xenia in the least, but they had been prepared to pay good money and she was in dire need, and so she had agreed to it on a trial basis. She and Mama had moved into rooms on the second floor and Gwen and Luke took all the bedrooms on the first floor. The large reception rooms became studios and communal spaces. The stables were workshops where furniture was made in the traditional style, stone was cut, wood carved, glass melted and remade. They even made a forge in the old pigsties. A large round table built by Luke from wood cut down in the park had taken pride of place in the empty dining room, the grand mahogany furniture long since sold off, and provided space for thirty people to eat at the same time.

  Those had been happy days, Xenia thought. Unexpectedly happy. She had expected to hate the invasion of uncultured youth but instead, she had been surprised by the way the house had felt alive, with children running about, creative energy sparking everywhere, the parties and the laughter.

  Like the old days, when we first arrived at Charcombe. And there was Harry. How could I forget him? Where is he now? Is he dead too?

  It had all come to an end, as everything did. Luke got tired of it, Gwen got painful, twisting arthritis and couldn’t work any more. The students stopped coming. They cleared out the stables and the house, and went, leaving only rubbish behind. Then she was alone again, in the great whistling space, wishing she could have it back the way it used to be, in the glory days.

  The glory days!

  It made her think of Mama when she was at the height of her power, before everything conspired to break her.

  Chapter Sixteen

  1950

  A governess came to the house on Bristol Avenue but Xenia found the lessons deathly, and the sight of the tantalising swimming pool below too much to bear. After the third session with the governess, she went outside into the bright sunshine to find her mother, who was sitting on the terrace under a large sun umbrella, wearing her dark glasses as usual, recovering on one of her rare afternoons off. Papa sat nearby reading Variety.

  ‘Please, Mama, mayn’t I have my lessons on the set? Then I could come out and watch when I’m allowed a break.’ She draped her arms around her mother’s neck. ‘I’m lonely here!’

  She knew it was a good card to play, because her mother felt guilty there were no brothers and sisters to keep Xenia amused.

  ‘I don’t know . . .’ Mama put down her drink, clear liquid over dissolving ice cubes, and looked over to her husband. ‘Paul, what do you think?’

  ‘What?’ Papa looked up from the
newspaper he was reading, talking over the cigarette between his teeth. ‘What did you say?’

  ‘Xenia wants to do her lessons on set.’

  Papa thought for a moment. ‘Let her, if you want. In fact, why bother with the lessons? You should dismiss the governess. It’s only a few days more, and she’ll learn plenty on set with a book or two to keep her occupied when she’s not watching the filming.’

  The filming was going well. Papa went to the set every day and at home, he and Mama worked on her performance. The lines were no longer a problem, because they were said all day long: over the dinner table, in the sitting room, on the terrace, while Mama was swimming up and down the turquoise waters of the pool, and late at night. Xenia knew the role herself, she’d heard the lines so often.

  Mama leaned on Papa more than ever, looking to him for all the reassurance she needed. But Xenia felt that Papa’s patience was growing strained and close to snapping; she felt it in the restrained irritation he exuded and the way he frowned and grimaced when Mama walked over to the drinks table in the evening.

  One night she’d heard Papa talking loudly in the drawing room and had sneaked downstairs to listen.

  ‘Put that down,’ Papa was saying. ‘It doesn’t help, can’t you see? It makes it all worse!’

  ‘Please, Paul, I need it.’

  ‘I don’t understand, Natalie. You can act, can’t you? How hard can it be to say your lines and be on your mark? You’ve never had a problem before.’

  ‘It calms me down. I’m frightened, when they all expect so much of me. I know how much is riding on this film, and how everybody is waiting for it. They expect me to be so wonderful – I got this amazing part instead of all those other actresses, so I must be special! It’s a nightmare . . . all those eyes turned on me, the cameras, the silence I have to act into. It’s not like the theatre – I can’t see the audience there, and anyway, they love me. I can give to them, it’s easy. But on the set . . .’ Mama’s voice rose with passion. ‘They all hate me, Paul! I can feel them waiting for me to spoil it, so they can hate me more.’

  ‘You’re imagining things. Do you think they want to waste time and money with your mistakes? Don’t be so stupid.’

  ‘No! That’s just it. They’re all against me.’

  ‘Archibald isn’t against you. I think he believes in you. He’s desperate for you to succeed, that’s why he takes you out all the time and tries to help you with your part.’

  ‘He knows it’s too late to replace me. But he hates me for not being what he expected. He thought he was getting one of those steely professionals, like Crawford, or Stanwyck. And he got me! Please, Paul, let me have a drink, it makes me braver, it makes me stronger . . .’

  ‘You’re being foolish, it spoils your looks and makes you slow.’

  ‘Don’t you love me any more?’ She sounded plaintive, desperate. ‘I saw you looking at that girl who plays the secretary. I know she’s beautiful. Is she more beautiful than me?’

  ‘That’s ridiculous and beneath you. Listen to me, Natalie, no more drink until the film is over. But you can take these to help you sleep. The studio doctor gave them to me when I told him about your problems. The blue ones are best to sleep, and the white to wake up with . . .’

  Xenia crept away, afraid. She remembered Papa on the boat, telling that woman how damaged and difficult Mama was. Could he be right? Xenia had always known that Mama was hard on herself and didn’t believe she was good enough, but Xenia thought that was a loveable quality, like modesty or humility. Perhaps, after all, it was a terrible affliction that undermined her and stood in the way of her ever properly enjoying her success or reaching her potential.

  But Papa is here. Papa will look after her.

  It was the tone in Papa’s voice that frightened her the most. Mama leaned on him more than anyone else in the world. If Papa ever did grow bored of her fears and difficulties, or if she ever stopped being the wonderful Natalie Rowe . . . what then?

  ‘Darling, when you come to the set, will you bring something for me?’

  Xenia pushed her covers away, blinking. It was growing light outside her bedroom, the sky baby blue with pink streaks as the golden sun rose for another blazing day. Mama was sitting on the end of her bed, already in her jacket, her hair in a turban and her face bare, ready for the drive to the studio. Xenia yawned and said, ‘Yes, Mama.’

  She pulled a large silver Thermos out of her bag. ‘Can you fit this into your school bag?’

  Xenia nodded.

  ‘Then will you bring it in with you to my trailer when you come? But don’t tell Papa, will you? He doesn’t understand that I need my tonic to help me on the set. It’s such a long day.’ She leaned over and put the flask on the night table, then looked into Xenia’s eyes. ‘Tell me honestly, do you think I’m still pretty?’

  Xenia stared back at her mother. She could see dark circles under her eyes, and the whites were crazed with red lines at the edges. Her skin had a greyish pallor and hollows under the high cheekbones. The doctor had put Mama on a strengthening diet of mostly eggs, meat, milk and spinach, but she seemed to be getting thinner and thinner.

  ‘Absolutely,’ Xenia said emphatically. ‘You are the most beautiful woman in the world.’

  She meant it from her depths. Mama’s green eyes, the arched brows, the soft dark hair and the exquisite cupid’s bow mouth below that straight nose with the faintest upturned swoop at the end – Xenia could not conceive of greater beauty. The make-up lady, Sissy, would cover the dark circles and the blotches on her neck and add the colour to her face with rouge and plump her cheeks with those brown and white shadows. Drops of special liquid would make her eyes sparkle white again. Then she would be back to her lovely self.

  Mama engulfed her in a hug. ‘Oh, thank you, darling, thank you! What a wonderful daughter you are. I know I can depend on you.’

  When she was gone, Xenia opened the flask and sniffed the contents, but there was almost no smell, just a faint astringency, like something from the medicine cupboard. She packed it carefully into her school bag to take into the studio with her books.

  On set, Xenia lingered in the darkness as usual, mostly tucked away on her little chair. She had put the flask by Mama’s couch in her trailer, and instead of reading the book of Greek myths she’d been given to study, she watched the goings-on: the sets being changed, the props laid out or refreshed, the cameras and lights being adjusted. It was all so interesting.

  Mama knew her lines, at least. Her trouble seemed to be keeping herself still when the camera stopped rolling. She often appeared to be swaying slightly, and she frequently disappeared into a dreamy state, her eyes turning up towards the great lights hanging from their bars as if gazing into the heavens. A sharp shout from Archibald Thomas would usually bring her back, and a talk with Papa – rapid whispers at the corner of the set, or a quick conference in the trailer – could also restore her. And when filming began, she was still able to project that strange quality that looked like a kind of inner stillness. Xenia knew it was something special because she’d heard Archibald Thomas talking about it to the assistant director.

  ‘Don’t you see what I mean?’ he’d murmured. ‘It looks like nothing when she does it and then, on the screen . . . on the rushes . . . she’s sheer magic. I’ve rarely seen such luminescence. It’s why we can believe men want to kill for her love. That’s why she’s Delilah. If we can just keep her on the right side of sober until the end of filming . . .’

  Today, Mama was in a beautiful evening gown, her hair dressed and her make-up perfect. The scene was a New York nightclub, and it was full of glamorous women but none of them could hold a candle to Mama. Xenia watched Mama being whirled around the dance floor by the handsome actor who played the man she loved. When they had dialogue to record, she and the actor stood still on a piece of moving floor that turned them around from side to side, as though they were dancing, but kept them in front of the camera while the other dancers moved around them, back
and forth in a semi-circle.

  Then someone had the idea that it would be fun for Xenia herself to appear in the scene, as one of the coat-check girls.

  ‘Put her in one of the black dresses and do her hair, she’ll look quite grown-up,’ said the script editor, a friendly faced young woman with dyed red hair and glasses shaped like a cat’s eyes. She smiled at Xenia. ‘It’ll be fun! Something to tell your friends when you get back to England, huh?’

  They put it to Archibald Thomas, who laughed and said it was fine if Natalie was happy.

  ‘Do you want to, darling?’ Mama asked, smiling.

  Xenia was stunned. To appear in Mama’s film, even as one of those mousy creatures who took the coats? It was too exciting to think about. ‘Yes please,’ she said breathlessly.

  They put her in a make-up room, not Mama’s trailer but a room with dozens of metal chairs in front of one long mirror, where they painted the faces of the extras and bit part actors. The long table was scattered with pots of grease in different colours, palettes of coloured powders, tubs of brushes and hundreds of balls of cotton wool, some stained brown and red and discarded. A gum-chewing girl stood beside her, looking quizzically at Xenia’s face in the mirror.

  Xenia stared at her reflection. It was so familiar and so ordinary, a world away from Mama’s velvety beauty: a round, pale face; startled blue eyes. Her nose was like her mother’s in that it had an upward tilt at the end, but hers was chunkier, like Papa’s. Her mouth, though, had that sharp little cupid’s bow and pointed upper lip, and small soft cushion of a lower lip, that did look like Mama’s.

  ‘We can do something with you,’ the make-up girl said. ‘You got a real pretty face.’

  ‘I have? I don’t think so . . .’

  The girl laughed, showing the wad of gum between her teeth. ‘I love your British accent, you sound like Basil Rathbone!’ She leaned in so that Xenia could smell her pepperminty breath. ‘They say you’re a real princess too – is that right?’