Victoria Holt

by The Shivering Sands

  “Have you told the Rendalls?”

  “Not yet. I fear when I do Mrs. Vicar will bring up the big guns. No one knows yet. I thought it appropriate to tell you first. Though of course I shall have to tell the vicar today. I must give him ample time to find a substitute. And, of course, if he does find someone before I shall retire gracefully.”

  “Mrs. Rendall will never allow that.”

  He smiled. “You haven’t asked for details.”

  “I haven’t had much opportunity yet. Please tell me.”

  “The most delightful parish…in the country…not too far from London so that visits will be frequently possible. An ideal spot. I know it well. An uncle of mine held the living at one time before his bishopric. I spent quite a lot of my childhood there.”

  “It certainly sounds ideal.”

  “It is, I do assure you. I’d like you to see it.”

  “And how long do you think you’ll remain there before you become a bishop?”

  He looked at me reproachfully. “You make me sound like an ambitious man.”

  I put my head on one side. “Some are born to honors, some earn them, and others have them thrust upon them.”

  “The quotation is not quite correct but the meaning is clear. Do you believe that some people are born as they say with a silver spoon in their mouths?”

  “Perhaps. But it is possible to acquire a spoon even if one hasn’t been born with one.”

  “What a lot of effort is saved when it’s already there. You think life is too easy for me.”

  “I believe that life is what we make it…for us all.”

  “Some of us are lucky though.” His eyes fell on the marble statue of an angel. “We don’t have to look very far. Poor Napier Stacy whose life went wrong through a dreadful accident which could have happened to any boy! He picked up a gun which happened to be loaded and he killed his brother. If that gun hadn’t been loaded his life from then on would have been different. Fantastic, isn’t it?”

  “Fortunately chance is not always so cruel.”

  “No. Poor Napier!”

  It was like him to spare a thought for Napier in his present elation—for elated he was. He was looking to the future with eagerness and I didn’t blame him. While at the moment he was content to dally here, to be amused by Mrs. Rendall’s scheming—how could she possibly think that Sylvia would be a suitable wife for such a man?—to talk with me, to become mildly involved in the mystery of two strange disappearances.

  But it was more than that. He was thinking of me as earnestly as I was of him.

  Good heavens! I thought. I believe he is considering asking me to share this pleasant life of his. Not immediately, of course. Godfrey would never be impulsive. Perhaps that was the reason for his success. But it was there between us. At the moment an affectionate friendship existed, fostered by our common interests and our desire to solve the mystery. I was aware that life was offering me a chance to build something.

  “I’d like you to see the place sometime,” he went on warmly. “I’d like your opinion of it.”

  “I do hope you’ll show it to me…one day.”

  “You can be sure I shall.”

  I could see it clearly in my mind’s eye, a gracious house with a beautiful garden. My home? My drawing room would look onto the garden and there would be a grand piano. I should play frequently but not professionally; music would be my pleasure and my solace but I should not need to teach impossible musicians again.

  I would have children. I could see them…beautiful children with placid happy faces—the boys looking like Godfrey, the girls like myself only young, innocent and unmarked by sorrow. I wanted children now as once I had wanted to startle the world with my music. The desire to win fame on the concert platform had gone. Now I wanted happiness, security, a home and a family.

  And although Godfrey was not ready to make a declaration yet and I was not ready to give him an answer, it was as though I had really come to the end of that dark tunnel and I was looking at the sunny paths spread out before me.

  ***

  When Mrs. Rendall heard the news about Godfrey she was not unduly depressed. Six months was a long time and, as Godfrey said, a great deal could happen in that time. Sylvia must grow up; Sylvia must change from an ugly duckling into a swan. Therefore she must pay more attention to her appearance. Miss Clent, the seamstress of Lovat Mill, was sent for and she made a new wardrobe for Sylvia.

  Mrs. Rendall saw only one reason why her plans should go awry. A certain scheming adventuress, she believed, had her eyes on the prize.

  I was put into the picture by the girls whose remarks, sometimes candid, sometimes oblique, made me aware of what was being attributed to me. Godfrey and I would laugh together over this and sometimes I felt that he considered it only natural that in due course he and I would slip into that relationship for which Mrs. Rendall had convinced herself I was scheming.

  Sometimes I would find Alice’s grave eyes fixed on me.

  She began embroidering a pillowcase “for a bottom drawer,” she told me.

  “Yours?” I asked; and she shook her head and looked mysterious.

  She was so industrious and whenever she had a spare moment she would bring out the needlework which she carried in a bag embroidered in wools—her own work, which her mother had taught her.

  I knew the pillowcase was for me because she was naive enough to ask my opinion.

  “Do you like this pattern, Mrs. Verlaine? It would be easy to do another.”

  “I like it very much, Alice.”

  “Alice has had a great affection for you, since…” began Mrs. Lincroft.

  “Since the fire, yes.” I smiled. “It’s because she saved my life. I think she feels extremely gratified every time she looks at me.”

  Mrs. Lincroft turned aside to hide an uncharacteristic display of emotion. “I’m so glad she was there, so…so proud…”

  “I shall always be grateful to her,” I said gently.

  The other girls had started to make pillowcases.

  “It’s very good,” said Alice looking at me almost maternally, “to have a good supply of everything.”

  Alice’s work was neat and clean like herself—Allegra’s was quickly grubby. In any case I did not think she would finish it. As for Sylvia, hers was not a success either. Poor Sylvia, I thought, forced to help furnish the bottom drawer for the prospective bride of the man her mother had chosen for her!

  I watched them, their heads bent over their work, and I felt an affection for all of them; they had become so much a part of my life. I always found their conversation unexpected, often amusing and never dull.

  Alice was exclaiming in dismay because Sylvia had pricked her fingers and had made a spot of blood on the pillowcase.

  “You would never earn your living by sewing,” she reproved.

  “I wouldn’t want to.”

  “But you might have to,” put in Allegra. “Suppose you were starving and the only way to earn your living was by sewing. What would you do?”

  “Starve, I expect,” said Sylvia.

  “I’d go off with the gypsies,” put in Allegra. “They neither toil nor do they spin.”

  “That was the lilies of the field,” explained Alice. “Gypsies toil. They make baskets and clothes pegs.”

  “That’s not toiling. That’s fun.”

  “It’s meant…” Alice paused and said with effort: “figuratively.”

  “People who make shirts get very little money,” said Alice. “They work by candlelight all day and all night and they die of consumption because they don’t get enough fresh air and food.”

  “How horrible!”

  “It’s life. Thomas Hood wrote a wonderful poem about it.”

  Alice began to quote in a deep sepulchral voice:

  “Stitch, sti
tch, stitch,

  In poverty hunger and dirt.

  Stitching at once with a double thread

  A shroud as well as a shirt.”

  “Shroud,” screeched Allegra. “These aren’t shrouds; they’re pillowcases.”

  “Well,” said Alice coolly, “they didn’t think they were stitching shrouds. They thought they were shirts.”

  I interrupted them and said what a ghoulish conversation. Wasn’t it time Alice put her pillowcase-cum-shroud away and came to the piano?

  Neatly she folded her work, threw back her hair and rose obediently.

  ***

  Lovat Stacy was indeed haunted—by the gypsy Serena Smith. I often saw her near the house, and once or twice strolling across the garden. She did not do this furtively but as if by right and I was becoming more and more convinced that she was Allegra’s mother. That would account for her proprietary air and her insolence.

  Coming into the house one day I heard her voice—shrill and carrying.

  “You’d better, hadn’t you?” she was saying. “You wouldn’t want to go against me, would you? Ha. There’s people here that wouldn’t like me telling things about them but you more than anyone, I reckon. That’s the way I see it. So there’ll be none of this talk about ‘Get the gypsies off.’ The gypsies are here to stay…see!”

  There was silence and I thought sick at heart: Napier, oh Napier. What trouble you have brought on yourself. How could you become involved with a woman like this!

  Then the voice again. “Oh yes, Amy Lincroft…Amy Lincroft. I could let out some secrets about you and your precious daughter, couldn’t I? And you wouldn’t want that.”

  “Amy Lincroft.” Not Napier!

  I was about to turn away when Serena Smith came out. She was running and her face was flushed and her eyes sparkling. How like Allegra she looked—Allegra in a mischievous mood!

  “Why,” she cried, “if it’s not the music lady! Ear to the ground, eh, lady…or to the keyhole?” She burst out laughing, and I could do nothing but walk into the hall.

  No one was there and I wondered whether Mrs. Lincroft had heard her remarks. She must have. But I expected she was too embarrassed to talk to me.

  ***

  At dinner Mrs. Lincroft was as cool and calm as ever. “I hope you like the way I’ve cooked this beef, Mrs. Verlaine. Alice, take this beef tea up to Sir William, will you? And when you come down I’ll be ready to serve.”

  Alice carried the dainty tray out of the room and I said what an obedient child she was.

  “It’s a great comfort to me that she should be so,” said Mrs. Lincroft. My thoughts immediately went to the words of the gypsy; and I wondered once again whether there ever had been a Mr. Lincroft or whether Alice was the result of a youthful indiscretion. This could be likely for I had never heard Mr. Lincroft mentioned.

  Mrs. Lincroft seemed to read my thoughts for she said: “I do wish Mrs. Rendall would not interfere with the gypsies. They’re doing no harm.”

  “She certainly seems determined to drive them away.”

  “If only she were as gentle and peace-loving as her husband how much more comfortable life would be for us.”

  “And for the vicar and Sylvia particularly.”

  Mrs. Lincroft nodded.

  “I expect you’ve guessed who this Serena Smith is. You’ve heard some of the family history.”

  “You mean she’s AIlegra’s mother.”

  Mrs. Lincroft nodded. “It’s all so unfortunate. Why ever she was allowed to come here in the first place I can’t imagine. She worked in the kitchen…though she did little work. And then of course she became embroiled with Napier…and Allegra was the result. It all came out immediately after Beaumont’s death when Napier was preparing to leave. She stayed here till the child was born and then she went.”

  “Poor Allegra!”

  “I came back and looked after her in time…It suited me well as I was able to bring Alice with me.”

  “Yes,” I said sympathetically.

  “And now here she is again…ready to make trouble unless we allow the gypsies to stay. That would be all right. They would never stay long. But that dreadful interfering woman has to try to make an issue of it. Do you know I believe she likes to make trouble.”

  At that moment Mrs. Lincroft really looked troubled; there was a frown between her eyes and she bit her lips, lowering her eyes as she did so.

  Alice came back; she was a little flushed and her eyes were dancing.

  “He’s taking it Mamma. He said it was very good and that no one knew how to make it just like you.”

  “Then he is a little better.”

  “And it is all thanks to you, Mamma,” said Alice.

  “Come to the table, my dear,” said Mrs. Lincroft, “and I’ll serve.”

  I thought how pleasant it was to see the affection between those two.

  ***

  Sir William was a little better, for the next day Mrs. Lincroft joyfully told me that he had expressed a desire to hear me play. He had not been told about the fire. There was no need to upset him, said Mrs. Lincroft and I agreed with her. Since that unfortunate occasion when I had played Danse Macabre I had not been to the room next to his. I could quite imagine why not. Any reminder of that day would be most distressing to him. However, it was clearly a good sign that he had asked for me to play.

  “Something light and quiet that you have played before,” said Mrs. Lincroft. “He hasn’t chosen. He’s not really well enough. But you will know.”

  “Schumann, I should think,” I said.

  “I am sure you’re right. And not too long…”

  I was a little nervous remembering that other occasion; but as soon as I played I felt better. After half an hour I stopped playing and as I turned from the piano I was startled to see someone in the room—a woman with her back to me wearing a hat of black lace trimmed with pink roses. She was looking up at the picture of Beau and for a moment I thought that this was indeed the dead Isabella. Then there was a laugh and Sybil turned to face me.

  “I startled you,” she whispered.

  I admitted. “If Sir William had seen you,” I said, “he might have…”

  She shook her head. “He couldn’t leave his chair. And it was your playing that shocked him.”

  “I played only what was put out for me.”

  “Oh, I know. I know. I’m not blaming you, Mrs. Verlaine.” She laughed. “So you thought you really had lured my sister-in-law from the grave by your playing? Confess it.”

  “You intended me to think that, did you?”

  “No, of course not. I wouldn’t want to frighten you. I just didn’t think of it. I put on my hat because I thought of going into the garden. And I came in here instead. You didn’t hear me. You were so absorbed in your music. You are all right now. I don’t frighten you, do I? You are very calm, you know, even now after what happened in that cottage. You’re like Mrs. Lincroft. She has to be cool, doesn’t she, for fear of betraying herself. Do you have to be calm for the same reason?”

  “I don’t quite understand what you mean.”

  “Don’t you? William is asleep now, so he is perfectly safe. Your music soothed him. ‘Music hath charms to soothe the savage breast.’ He’s not savage now, but he has been. Come up to my studio. I want to show you something. I’ve started on my portrait of you.”

  “That’s very kind of you.”

  “Kind. I’m not kind. I’m not doing it for kindness. It’s because you’re becoming involved…part of the house. I’ve watched.”

  “I came here to play for Sir William.”

  “But he’s asleep. Go and look.”

  I went to the door and looked into his room. She was right. He was fast sleep.

  “You might wake him if you played on.”

  She laid her hand
on my arm…that little hand with the long tapering artist’s fingers which had once worn the ring she had thrown into the sea.

  “Come on,” she coaxed. So I went.

  In the studio I at once recognized the picture as a portrait of myself, although it shocked me a little. Did I really look as cool and worldly as she had depicted me? The features were mine—the slightly tiptilted nose, the large eyes and the heavy dark hair. There was even a touch in the eyes of that romanticism on account of which Pietro had teased me. But I felt that a veneer of sophistication was there which I did not believe I possessed.

  She watched my vague discomfiture with a faintly malicious delight.

  “You recognize it,” she accused me.

  “Oh, yes, of course. There can be no doubt who it is.”

  She put her head on one side and regarded me shrewdly. “You know,” she said, “you are beginning to change. The house is doing that to you. It does something to everyone. A house is a living thing, don’t you agree, Mrs. Verlaine?”

  I said that as it was made of bricks and mortar I did not see how it could be.

  “You are being deliberately obtuse, I know. Houses are alive. Think what they’ve seen. Joys, tragedies…” Her face crumpled. “These walls have seen me weep and weep until I had no tears left…and then they saw me rise like the phoenix and find a reason to be happy again with my painting. That’s what happens to great artists sometimes, Mrs. Verlaine. And I’m an artist…not only in paint. Sybil! That’s what my parents christened me. Did you know it meant a wise woman?”

  I said I did.

  “Well, I watch and learn…so I grow wise. That Mrs. Rendall…I should paint her, I suppose. But she’s too obvious, isn’t she? Everyone can see what she is like. They don’t need to be told. Other people are less obvious. Amy Lincroft for instance. Ah, there’s a deep one. And she’s worried now…I sense it. She thinks I don’t. But she betrays it in her hands. They pick up things and put them down. She’s practiced keeping her face in order…she’s practiced very hard at that. But everyone has some special thing which betrays them. With Amy Lincroft it’s her hands. She’s afraid. She lives in fear. She has a secret…a black black secret, and she’s a frightened woman. But she’s lived with fear and thinks she knows how to hold it in check. But I wasn’t called Sybil for nothing, so I know it.”