Eleanor had grown up believing that if she was kind and truthful, good things would happen to her and the people she loved. As a nineteen-year-old, twenty-nine-year-old Henry’s arrival in her life had been unexpected but in perfect symmetry with her thinking. She’d been the one to volunteer to undertake the painstaking, time-consuming work of finalising her grandparents’ estate. As a reward Henry had come into her life.
She’d once made the mistake of expressing her beliefs to Hope. Her sister had laughed loudly. ‘If it hadn’t been Henry who pinpointed you as a little rich heiress worth chasing, it would have been some other vulture of an antiques expert, Eleanor. Don’t be so naive.’
All their lives, Hope had been ready with the putdowns and the insults. Yet Eleanor had never been able to cut herself off from her only sister. The family bonds, the sisterly bonds, were too deep. Especially once their parents had died, within two years of her marriage to Henry. The best of times, the worst of times. Never had a quotation been so apt.
A part of Eleanor wished she felt able to accept Hope’s offer, as much to protect Gracie as witness Hope’s alleged cleansing ritual. But she’d realised eight years ago she could never go back there again. Any good times she’d remembered had been wiped away in an instant by Nina that day in the hospital in Rome.
No, she wouldn’t think about that day, about Nina, about Henry. She wouldn’t.
It was too late. Thoughts of him, of the two of them, were already spilling into her mind, sparked by Hope’s casual mention of Henry, her refusal to confirm or deny if she’d invited him. It was at moments like those that Eleanor knew the malicious Hope was still there, under all the compassionate talk. Hope had always known Eleanor’s weak spots. She’d always known Henry was Eleanor’s weakest spot of all.
Eleanor had always strived to be a woman of intelligence, education, discernment. But if that was so, how could she still love Henry after all he’d done over the years? Still want to know where he was, what he was doing. Who he was sleeping with. Why hadn’t she ended it between them years ago, when she first realised he wasn’t faithful to her?
It had been just a few years into their marriage. Charlotte and Audrey were small. Her growing suspicions about Henry’s interest in a work colleague had been confirmed by something as clichéd as a receipt in his suit pocket for a necklace she hadn’t been given. Had that been her first, her biggest, mistake? Should she have confronted Henry that night? Told him what she’d guessed, told him it was unacceptable, rather than just push the receipt back in his jacket pocket and run to her sister?
On the surface, Hope had been so supportive, so outraged on her behalf. ‘I don’t want to say I told you so, but I told you so.’
‘I loved him, Hope. I still love him.’
‘You want to stay with him?’
Eleanor had nodded, miserable. She did. It didn’t make sense, but she did.
Hope was there for her again, two years later, when Eleanor suspected a second affair. There were phone calls late at night, hang-ups if Eleanor answered. Henry suddenly had a lot of dinner engagements. A year later, a third affair that lasted only a few weeks. Eleanor knew all the signs by then. Henry’s distracted air, overly busy workload …
‘Leave him,’ Hope urged each time. ‘How can you put up with this?’
‘I love him. I can’t help it. And I can’t leave. I couldn’t do it to the girls.’
‘Then confront him.’
Eleanor couldn’t. She was too scared of what she might hear. She waited, instead. And soon enough, each time, something told her that Henry was all hers again.
It became the pattern of their lives. When Henry wasn’t occupied elsewhere, she couldn’t have been happier. She learnt to compartmentalise her life. Whenever he became distracted, she forced herself to blame his work. And perhaps it was his work sometimes. By the time Charlotte was five and Audrey four, he was becoming one of the best-known antiques experts in the country, his client list long and prestigious.
At the same time, Hope’s own career as a garden designer was taking off. She’d started calling around several nights a week. Her drinking was heavy but controlled. In front of Eleanor one evening, Henry and Hope discussed one of his clients, owners of a large estate in Kent needing a garden redesign. Perhaps Hope could travel with him, meet them, see what might come of it?
When they came back, something was different between them. Eleanor accused them both, one night after dinner. She’d just put the girls to bed, was tired. She was always tired. In the dining room Henry and Hope were laughing, telling stories, smoking, drinking, while she fetched drinks, made dinner, cleaned up. Hope’s latest boyfriend was supposed to have been there, but she’d arrived on her own. ‘He’s a fool,’ was all Hope would say, not apologising for not letting her know, or for the waste of food.
A loud burst of laughter from Hope while Eleanor was in the kitchen at the sink was the last straw. She came in and threw the glass she’d been washing onto the floor. It shattered noisily. ‘What happened? What happened when you were away together?’
Henry just raised an eyebrow. ‘Good Lord, darling. That glass was valuable.’
Hope laughed. They both laughed again, looking at each other, not at her.
Eleanor knew in that moment that something had happened. ‘I want to know or I’ll break every glass, every plate and every piece of furniture in this house.’
Henry stood up. ‘Eleanor, nothing happened! Darling, what’s got into you?’
Hope slowly stood up then too, confidently, elegantly. Eleanor was reminded of a cobra.
‘Henry, tell her. Or if you won’t, I will.’ At Henry’s hesitation, Hope continued. ‘Eleanor, you’re right. Something did happen. But it wasn’t important. Just something silly. One drunken kiss. That’s all, I promise.’
Eleanor saw from the look on Henry’s face that it was true. She turned to her sister. ‘Get out of my house.’
‘Henry started it. Don’t blame me.’
‘Get out. Henry is my business.’
‘You might want to remind him of that.’
Hope took a long time to gather her coat, pick up her bag, walk out to the hall. They waited for the sound of the front door closing. It slammed.
Only then did Eleanor turn to her husband. ‘I won’t put up with this, Henry. I turned a blind eye to all the others, but not this time. Not Hope. I want you to leave.’
His reaction shocked her. He started to cry. Not just tears. Sobs. He started talking, the words pouring out of him, explanations, apologies. ‘Please, Eleanor, don’t do this to us. We need each other. I love you so much. I love the girls. It was madness. I was worried about the business, about money. They were just distractions.’
‘It was Hope, Henry. My sister.’
‘She was playing with me. It was a game. It was one kiss, Eleanor, one kiss and she only did it to try and make trouble between us. She’s always been jealous of you, of you and me. Can’t you see that? Eleanor, don’t let her win. Don’t let this be the finish of everything between us. I’m begging you.’
Back and forth their conversation went. He was so passionate, so persuasive. And she still loved him.
It was past midnight before she started to waver. ‘I have to be able to trust you.’
‘How can I help you?’
‘I don’t know, Henry. But you have to try.’
For the next few years, they were the perfect couple. She only saw Hope rarely, and always separately from Henry, deliberately. If her sister asked, she told her everything was fine. She hinted that it was better than fine, smiled secretly, knowing it would infuriate Hope. She noticed, with a kind of pleasure, that Hope was drinking more, taking something else too, tablets of some kind, drugs of some description. There were times Eleanor could have stepped in, tried to stop her and each time she didn’t. It was a deliberate decision. Let her drown in her own sorrows, she thought.
She and Henry began trying for another baby. And tried. Nothing happened. Th
ere was sex, regularly, at the right times, at more than the right times. Still nothing. Was it that she didn’t completely trust him yet? Their regular moves began around the same time, to Brighton, to Yorkshire, back to London, back to Brighton. She blamed her problems getting pregnant on that instead. On her study load too, her decision to gain a teaching degree, to specialise in home education. The stress of two young children. Charlotte was a stubborn child even then; Audrey needy, often tearful. Until finally, she became pregnant with Gracie. Less than a year later, Spencer was conceived.
She was soon so busy with the four children and her own studies that her relationship with Henry was the least of her worries. He was travelling for work more than ever. She asked him once, ‘Can I still trust you?’ He’d kissed her, smiled the smile – his real one, which made her feel so good – and told her, his gaze direct, that he loved her, he loved his family, that yes, she could trust him. But did she? She was honestly too tired to care some nights.
At the same time, Hope was spiralling rapidly downwards. Eleanor would hear the front door bell at two a.m., even later sometimes, and go downstairs to find her sister slumped on the front step. Never a sign of how she had got there, no taxi idling, no car driving away. Eleanor would bite back the anger, help her in, put her to bed in the spare room and let her sleep it off. Sometimes it took a day, sometimes more. At first she helped her, tried to shield the children from what was happening, made excuse after excuse. Hope was unwell, was under stress at work. The truth was Hope hadn’t worked in months. She’d been living off what was left of their parents’ inheritance. After getting advice from a local doctor, Eleanor tried what was called ‘tough love’. Not answering Hope’s calls. Not letting her stay if she arrived drunk. Ignoring her rambling messages on the answering machine. Until the day some sixth sense made Eleanor call to Hope’s apartment, hammer repeatedly on the door, finally obtain a key from the landlord and get inside to find her sister unconscious on the floor, an empty wine bottle and scattered pills beside her. An hour later and Hope would have been dead, the ambulance man told her. Everything changed from that day on. Hope became Eleanor’s main responsibility.
They were back living in London, Gracie was eight, Spencer six and the two older girls in their early teens, when Henry arrived home one afternoon from his latest buying trip. She knew immediately that something big had happened. There was a mood off him, an excitement.
His expression, however, was calm. ‘Eleanor, I had a phone call while I was in Yorkshire from a solicitor in London, working on behalf of a legal firm in Melbourne. They’ve been trying to track me down for some time. I’ve been at their offices in Chelsea today.’
She tensed, expecting it to be bad news. The reality was more unexpected.
He handed her a photograph. It was of a two-storey mansion, a beautiful, classic design. The setting was unusual, dry-looking grounds, a vivid blue sky. Perhaps it was in Spain or France.
‘What do you think?’ Henry asked.
‘It’s beautiful. The blue sky as much as the house. Is it a new job?’
‘In a manner of speaking.’ He paused. ‘Eleanor, it’s mine. Ours.’
‘How lovely.’ She thought he was joking. She was used to him returning from jobs with gifts for her: a small piece of jewellery, an unusual vase, a delicate cup that he thought she’d like. But a house? She went along with it for the moment. ‘And where is it, Henry?’
‘Australia.’
‘Australia?’
He explained, then repeated it. She couldn’t take it all in. ‘You’ve inherited this house? Is that what you mean? But how? From who? And why only now?’
He told her again all the solicitor had explained to him. The house had been built during the Victorian goldrush, by a long-distant relative, a businessman called Leonard Templeton, the youngest son of a family of London merchants. A cousin in England inherited it, but didn’t live in it. The land surrounding it was sold for grazing. A complicated lease arrangement was set up, managed by a local firm of solicitors, but the ownership had always remained with descendants of that original Leonard Templeton.
‘It was my father’s great-uncle who owned it last. I never met him. I don’t even think my father met him. It’s taken this long for the solicitors to untangle the lease arrangements, but what it comes down to is this, Eleanor. I’m next in line. It’s mine. Ours.’
It was incredible. Incredible. She looked at the photo, turned it over as if hoping to find more detail there. ‘But if no one’s been living in it for years, it must be in ruins inside.’
No, Henry assured her. It had always been well maintained. It had been leased to an Australian pastoral farmer and his family until recently.
‘But what will we do with it?’
He paused. ‘I thought we could live in it.’
More laughter until she realised he was serious.
‘Eleanor, I’m in something of a predicament.’
That night he talked more than he ever had to her about his work. It was an unusual trade, the antiques business, he explained. So much of it was on supply and demand. It depended on so many factors – who wanted an item badly enough, perception, rarity. Who was to say that one piece of silverware was worth ten thousand pounds when another was worth less? From his point of view, there was also often a fine line of honesty to cross. If an elderly woman was showing him one item, and he knew it was worth nothing compared to the small brooch she was wearing, was it criminal to casually make an offer for that as well? If he was asked to sell on consignment, was it immoral or simply good business to buy the entire lot himself, pay the seller what he or she believed was a good price, and not divulge that four of the pieces in the two-hundred-item lot would fetch many more thousands? Hundreds of thousands, even? As for another hypothetical situation – what if the seller of some rare jewellery preferred not to disclose the items’ origin? Was it Henry’s role to push for details, or simply to find a buyer?
‘You’ve been dealing in stolen property? Is that what you’re saying?’
‘I have to make moral calls every hour of every day, Eleanor. I’ve realised there are degrees of deception.’
How that sentence would come to haunt her.
She picked up the photograph of the sun-soaked mansion. ‘So we’d be running away?’
‘We’d be withdrawing discreetly for the time being.’
‘To do what? Lie low in the Australian outback?’
‘Not just lie low, no. I need to do some more family research, but I’ve had an idea, Eleanor. A crazy idea, but we might even be able to make a business of it. All I’d need is the start-up capital. A lump sum to get us on our feet.’
She knew what he was talking about. The rest of her inheritance. By the time they went to bed that night, she’d agreed.
Henry flew out to Australia first, to inspect the property and set his plans in motion. When Eleanor, Hope and the children arrived two weeks later, a full-scale renovation was already underway.
‘Can we afford this?’ she asked as he showed her sketches, fabric and wallpaper samples.
‘Of course.’
Of course they couldn’t, is what he should have said.
Hope had come with them, ostensibly to assist Henry with the garden design, in truth because she had no one left in England to take care of her. She was completely in the grip of her addictions by then. Secret drinking. The tablets. The erratic behaviour. But always the tears afterwards, the heartfelt gratitude. ‘Eleanor, what would I do without you? I’d be dead if it wasn’t for you.’
For all the heartbreak that followed, Eleanor had to acknowledge that there had been good times at the Hall. Henry had been the very best version of himself at first: busy, motivated, charming. She’d watched in amazement as his business idea became a thriving tourist attraction. It had felt good to work together, as a couple, a family …
Until the cracks began to appear again. The mail started to go missing. The bills, more specifically. After that, it was l
ike dominos falling, one event setting off another. She and Henry fighting all the time. Spencer’s wayward behaviour. Charlotte’s refusal to come home, her announcement about her job in Chicago. Audrey’s school play disaster. And Gracie, Eleanor’s little Gracie, falling in love with and practically moving in with Nina …
Nina.
Had it been happening between Nina and Henry even then? Under Eleanor’s nose? No, she refused to let it be true. She would have known, wouldn’t she? And Nina had been a friend then, to all of them, hadn’t she? They couldn’t have done without her in the first years after they left, either, calmly accepting every explanation they offered about why they weren’t coming back, even going to the trouble of packing and shipping all the belongings and paperwork they’d left behind in that first hasty departure.
Too busy working full-time, arguing with Henry about the outstanding debts, it had taken Eleanor years to find the energy to go through even a few of the boxes. It wasn’t until she had the house to herself, after Gracie had gone to France and Italy with Tom, that she’d made a proper start on them. Within minutes she’d been cursing Henry’s filing methods. His lack of filing methods, more accurately. There were folders filled with more bills and more lawyer demands bundled in with old brochures, magazine cuttings, school reports. But in one box she’d found folders filled with paperwork she’d never seen before.
Henry had been doing more than reading his antique magazines night after night in his office, it seemed. She found pages and pages of notes about his family’s history, early research into his family tree, sketches. Not just the details of the stories they liked to tell during the tours. This was different, more private, as if he was truly trying to find his place in the world. She was surprised how much it moved her.
She and Hope had always known exactly where they came from, who their parents, grandparents, great-grandparents were. Henry hadn’t had that. He hadn’t known his mother, who’d died when he was only two. His father had died when he was in his teens. The fact he’d virtually raised himself had made him an even more romantic figure to her.
At Home with the Templetons Page 40