by Jane Godman
“And you just happened to be dressed as a boy?”
I deliberately overemphasised my accent. “Meneer, you will have to excuse my ignorance of your English ways. I am used to a different lifestyle. Sometimes, in my own country, femininity can be an encumbrance so I borrow my brother’s clothing as a disguise. After all, you just never know what dangers you might encounter. But you are right, of course. Had I been dressed as I am today, I am sure you would not have handled me so roughly.” I gave him my sunniest smile.
For a moment, a black thundercloud of anger lowered his brow, and then, just as abruptly, it cleared and he burst out laughing. I watched him with bemusement. “Miss van der Merwe, I don’t know whether I can believe a single word you are saying! I will give you the benefit of the doubt, however…for now. I can see why your countrymen caused the British so much heartache with their unconventional tactics during the Boer War. Has anyone ever told you that you are quite unique?”
“No, but why would they? I expect I might be unusual in this setting, but in my own home I am, I assure you, quite ordinary.”
“You mean there are plenty more like you out there in the bushveldt? Heaven help me!”
“Oh, I shouldn’t imagine divine intervention will be necessary,” I told him in a comforting tone. “After all, you are most unlikely to ever visit my home, and I will not be in your country for much longer.” I smiled up at him again, an action which meant tilting my neck back. “I promise I mean your family no harm, Mr Jago. I will also undertake to stay out of your way as much as I can for the remainder of my stay. Does that reassure you?”
“I know it should,” he said, offering me his arm again. “So why do I still feel so ill at ease in your presence, Miss van der Merwe?”
I paused on my walk, gazing around with a combination of disbelief and something deeper. A certainty that I was meant to come to this place. I was here at last, at Lobber Point. The very place that was mentioned in a scrap of letter I had found all those thousands of miles away. I drew it from my pocket, even though I knew it by heart. It began oddly, almost as if in midconversation, without salutation or preamble.
I’m writing this note sitting on Lobber Point, looking down at Port Isaac as it basks in the sunshine. A million miles from Maheking and the awful events you described in your last letter. You were right, of course, Austell, old chap. Darling mama is quite distraught with worry about you. Papa, as a result, has a frown on his brow, which does not bode well for you when next you meet. I, being the dutiful son, have promised to apply for officer training at Sandhurst instead of following your lead and running away to enlist in the ranks.
I had not realised your soldierly soul held quite the sort of poetry revealed by your last outpouring. If Miss Monika van der Merwe has only a fraction of the beauty and virtue you ascribe to her, then I very much look forward to meeting—
It ended abruptly at that point, because the bottom part of the page had been torn away.
Our mother died when Rudi and I were eight. I remembered her as a beautiful and rather tragic figure. She never talked about our father. All she told us was that he was an English foot soldier, and she insisted that we must learn his language, but never tell anyone his nationality. After her death, and as we grew up, Rudi and I gradually pieced together the reasons for her reticence. The most important was fairly obvious. It did not take any great skill to deduce that we were illegitimate. Our name was van der Merwe. It was our mother’s name, and by no stretch of the imagination was it an English name. Rudi and I were born during the Boer War, when our nation was fighting the British. It spoke volumes about feelings in our country at that time that our mother could live with the shame of having bastard children, but not the shame of having children with an English father. As with any problem we had, we took our concerns to Ouma.
“He was a rooinek, sure enough,” she confirmed, using the derogatory Afrikaans term to describe the red, sunburned necks of the British soldiers who had arrived ill-equipped to face the fierce African sun. “Your ma was on a visit to my sister in Maheking when the siege began in October 1899. Eina! I was out of my mind with worry. My girl and my sister were trapped inside with the Brits while our people, the boers, were shelling the town from the outside. No news came out of the place for close on six months. Then—dank God—it was over and she was home safe. My sister was not so fortunate. She died of malaria just before the siege ended.” She sighed and then, with one of her swift mood changes, gave a coarse cackle. “But Monika, your ma, brought a little extra present for me. A big belly! And a few months later along you came, the two of you.” Her brow darkened. “She used to sit on the stoep and nurse you and look out at the mountain path. I knew she was waiting for him, jou vader—your father—to come. But he never did. Engels bliksem.”
“But me and Rudi are English bastards, aren’t we? We are Engels bliksem, too, Ouma,” I pointed out.
“There’s bliksem like you and there’s bliksem like him,” she said darkly, and refused to speak of our father again.
If it could be called a community at all, because of its far-flung nature, ours was a distinctly puritanical one. I went to a day school in Ladysmith, the nearest town. Although “nearest” still meant it was over an hour’s carriage ride away. Rudi, because of his disability, often had to be tutored at home. Looking back, neither of us could recall any specific incidents that made us feel uncomfortable. We were not struck down by a thunderbolt when we entered the church each Sunday, and nobody turned their back on us in the street. I like to think it was the force of Ouma’s personality that overcame any potential stigma. Of course, it also helped that she was one of the wealthiest landowners in the area. I had observed that, although I was always very popular with the young men of the neighbourhood, their mothers had a tendency to look upon me with something less than approbation. But that, Rudi pointed out, might have had more to do with some of the things I said and did than my illegitimacy.
I had found the scrap of letter in a trunk containing my mother’s clothes. When the rainy season came and the thunderstorms kept me indoors, Ouma compared me to a caged cheetah. I was not generally given to bursts of domestic activity, but I had become so bored by a period of weeklong inactivity that I was driven to offer to sort out some of the years of accumulated memories that resided in the vast roof space at Sonskyn Kraal.
“Stay up there as long as you feel inclined, Annie-girl,” Ouma said generously.
I pulled a face at her and mounted the steps to the attic. I had spent the best part of the day up there and had made some serious inroads into the junk when I found my mother’s trunk. The letter was tucked inside an old diary, which was interesting in itself because it had been written during her time at Maheking. It was also intensely frustrating, however, because many of the pages had been ripped out. Rudi and I pored over the letter hungrily and, despite the deepening sadness of Ouma’s expression, our travel plans had been born that day.
Chapter Three
I studied the family photographs that were arranged on the table closest to me. These were dominated by one that was particularly eye catching, not just because it was larger than the others. It depicted a man and woman, both dark haired, dressed in the clothing of an earlier decade. The woman, who was stunningly beautiful, had turned her head slightly to look up at the man and the affection between them was almost palpable, even in the stiffly posed portrait.
“What a handsome couple,” I commented.
“Oh, that’s Cad and Boo,” Finty said, and her expression relaxed as she studied the picture. “You may have heard of them, even in South Africa? Cad Jago and his wife, Bouche? In her heyday, Boo was never out of the society columns because of her beauty and her eye for fashion. They say that the Prince of Wales, the one who became King Edward the Seventh, took one look at her and fell madly in love. Pursued her like a demon, by all accounts. But, of course, she was utterly devoted to my father. My parents were really quite famous, but to me they were always just Cad
and Boo.” I raised my brows at the prospect of more strange names to contend with, and she laughed. “As a very young child, I couldn’t say ‘Bouche’ so she was ‘Boo.’ And my father was Charles, although the whole world knew him as Cad, for some reason lost forever in the mists of time.” She spread her hands as though in explanation. “Cad and Boo.”
“Did they approve of you calling them by those names instead of more conventional ones? ‘Mother’ and ‘Father,’ for example?” Rudi asked with an indulgent smile. Since our first invitation to tea, Rudi and I had become regular visitors to Athal House. I suspected our reasons for wanting to be there were completely different.
“Oh, yes, because I wasn’t really their daughter, you see. They adopted me. My real parents were estate workers who died in a train accident. I had no other family, so it was entirely typical of Boo to bring me to live here at Tenebris, instead of sending me to the orphanage. They were older then, of course. Boo just adored children.”
With the teacups cleared away, Rudi took his sketchbook out onto the cliffs and Finty eyed me thoughtfully.
“Your clothes are quite unusual, are they not, Annie? Of course, I know nothing of the prevailing fashions in Africa.”
I was wearing a full skirt in heavy wool that came almost to my ankles. It was an unprepossessing brown, and I wore it with a matching jacket over a white blouse. It was almost identical to Ouma’s Sunday best outfit. In comparison with Finty—who was clad in a soft, drop-waist dress in hues of peaches and cream—I felt like a carthorse next to a butterfly.
“I would love to wear something like your dress,” I confessed.
She clapped her hands together gleefully. “Oh, you have no idea how delighted I am to hear you say that! I didn’t want to offend you, but your own clothes are truly awful! And you are so pretty. No, not pretty exactly. Beautiful”—she put her head on one side and studied me—“stunning? Quite, quite lovely. But those things you have on today make you look odd. Aunt Eleanor agrees with me, you know, and she has an eye for these things. Of course, we were both lucky enough to have the benefit of darling Boo’s expertise. Now, I have thought up a plan…”
She held out her hand to me and, when I warily placed mine in it, hauled me off up the stairs. We traversed an alarming length of corridor. “That,” Finty whispered, indicating a set of gilt-embossed double doors, “is the earl’s bedchamber. Being made ready, of course, for the imminent arrival of its new occupant. We expect him any day now. And this, in comparison, is my humble abode.”
“What a beautiful room.” I drank in the light, bright space, the colours and furnishings of which seemed to perfectly match the view across the slate-grey cliffs as they descended into ravines. Humble was not the word I would have used.
“All of the rooms at Tenebris are lovely,” she said with a casual acceptance born of familiarity. “Tynan Jago was a poet who was also very artistic, so he designed this house to reflect the beauty of the Cornish scene. His wife, Lucy, was practical, so she made sure that the house was also comfortable. Those of us who live here now reap the benefits of their joint efforts. And, of course, Cad and Boo added some modern touches. I expect the new earl will want to change things to suit his own tastes.” She turned to a large trunk that sat in one corner. “You won’t be offended, Annie dearest? These are some of my darling Boo’s dresses. Rather outdated now, of course, but the materials are lovely and the colours are exactly what will suit you. Your colouring is dramatic, just like Boo’s. Aunt Eleanor is very talented with a needle, you know, and she has offered to alter some of these into the latest styles for you.”
“Finty, I couldn’t—”
“Shh! You would be doing her a great kindness. She has so very little to occupy her time these days. At least try on this bronze chiffon while I go and fetch her.” She fluttered away.
The dress I slipped into was full length with a slim silhouette, three-quarter-length sleeves and detailed embroidery across the fitted bodice. I studied my reflection in the mirror and found it made me look instantly taller and slimmer. Bouche Jago—or Boo, as Finty persisted in calling her—must have been a very clever lady, I decided.
“Oh!” Finty paused on the doorstep in the act of pushing Eleanor’s wheelchair into the room. They both stared at me with matching expressions of shock. Eleanor raised a shaking hand to her mouth, her blue eyes filling with sudden tears.
“What is it?” I gasped.
“Oh, Annie, it must have been a trick of the light as we came into the room.” Finty recovered her composure and came forward with an embarrassed laugh. “I thought you were Boo! You looked so like her that, just for a second, it was uncanny.”
“Well, I am going to take that as a huge compliment.” I laughed, but there was an edge of unease in my voice. I wasn’t sure I liked the idea of wearing a dead woman’s dress and being mistaken for her! Although the fact that Bouche Jago was acknowledged as the most beautiful woman of her day did take some of the sting out of the situation. Where was tomboy Annie now?
Finty became purposeful again and the moment passed. We spent a pleasant hour while I tried on other dresses, and we discussed how they could be adjusted into the latest styles.
“I have one or two things that really do not suit me, you know. The colours or shape are all wrong, but they would be perfect for you, Annie. Boo told me I should never wear bold colours, and to be perfectly honest, I don’t know what I was thinking when I bought them. You would be doing me a great favour if you would take them off my hands.” This was said with such a winning smile that I found it impossible to refuse, so when I descended the stairs again, I wore a straight, sleeveless coral dress with a scallop-edged neckline.
Nicca Jago, who was just entering the house, studied my new attire with a flare of masculine interest in his eyes that caught me unawares. It made me feel strange, like I didn’t know what to do with my limbs or my mouth.
“Rather a different look for you, Miss van der Merwe,” he remarked, his equanimity restored as he stood aside to allow me to enter the parlour.
I went into the room, but faced him warily. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“Exactly what it sounded like,” he replied coolly. “I take it Finty and Eleanor were responsible for this remarkable change in your appearance? You look very ladylike, but I observe there has been no corresponding alteration in attitude.”
Recalling our last conversation, I felt a blush of mingled anger and embarrassment tinge my cheeks. “I did not persuade them to give me these clothes! I didn’t come here today to beg, ask for money or seek handouts from Finty or Eleanor.”
Nicca’s lips twitched with suppressed amusement. “I don’t recall suggesting that you did.”
His calm manner infuriated me. I had a feeling that was his intention. “Ek sal jou ’n poesklap gee,” I muttered furiously and stormed out of the room again, pushing past Rudi, who was returning from the garden, sketchbook in hand.
Since I didn’t know my way around the house, I couldn’t go very far. I was still within earshot when I heard Nicca say, “What did she just say?”
“It was along the lines of how she would never get tired of slapping your face,” Rudi replied in his quiet way.
“What is the problem with that hellcat of a sister of yours?”
“Annie takes after our Ouma,” Rudi said mildly, as though that explained everything. And, in a way, it did.
“Ouma?”
“It is the Afrikaans word for ‘grandmother.’ Our own Ouma is the daughter of voortrekkers, the people who migrated into the heartland of South Africa and fought to establish new communities there. Her husband, our Oupa, died just after our mother was born, and since then, Ouma has run a vast farm single-handedly and very successfully. She is a tough, determined woman, and Annie is the image of her.”
“And what about the foul language?” I heard an undercurrent of amusement in Nicca’s deep, cultured tones.
“Voetsek, Meneer Jago,” I said under my breath, ki
cking the edge of an expensive, sculpted rug with the tip of my shoe.
Rudi gave a weary sigh. “I take it that means she’s been swearing again?”
“Like a trooper who has just heard that his leave has been cancelled.”
“That, too, comes from Ouma,” Rudi said. “They both have a mouth like the sewer when they get angry.” His voice softened. “Annie is a great girl, Mr Jago. But for several years now, because of my poor health, she and Ouma have run the farm between them. She’s used to getting her own way.”
“That makes two of us. Your sister may be an irresistible force, Mr van der Merwe, but she will find that I am an immovable object.”
I sensed a hint of a smile in Rudi’s next words. “If you want my advice, I wouldn’t let Annie hear you say that, Mr Jago. She’ll only see it as a challenge—” He was interrupted by Finty’s voice calling out a greeting, and I took the opportunity to slip out of the house.
The high-pitched whine of a horse in distress drew me toward the stables. A beautiful, young mare, black as midnight, was quivering in her stall. Eyes huge, nostrils dilated, flanks heaving. When she saw me, she flinched, and I saw the bloody ridges on her shoulders where someone had made liberal use of the whip. I wanted to smash the wooden door and rage curses on whoever had done this to her. Instead, I contented myself with swearing quietly under my breath to get it out of my system, before starting to whisper to her in the singsong tones I had heard Jabu use so many times at home.