I recall now every detail of that night, every facet of its colour and shade: the purple barrel of the pen I wrote with, the amber hue of the whisky in my glass, the grey whorls of cigarette smoke climbing towards the ceiling – and the blackness of the London night, pressing against the windows.
A few minutes after eleven o’clock. I can remember checking how late it was by my watch, stubbing out a cigarette, massaging my forehead, then rising from the couch and walking to the window. The panes were misty: it was growing cold outside. But coldness, in that moment, was what I most desired. I pulled up the sash and leaned out into the chill darkness, breathed in deeply and glanced down into the street.
She was standing beneath a lamp-post on the opposite pavement, a slight and motionless figure staring straight up at me as I felt sure she had been staring up at the window before I had even reached it, a figure in mourning black whom I knew well. What had brought her there I could only guess, what she was thinking I did not dare to. There was something of doubt as well as scrutiny in her gaze – and something also of hope. Half a minute of silent appraisal passed that seemed to compress within it all the weeks of her absence. Then I signalled that I would come down and raced to the door.
She was standing on my side of the road by the time I reached the front steps of the block. At closer range, her anguish was unmistakable. Her dark eyes scoured my face, her lips quivered uncertainly. As I descended towards her, she moved back a pace. There must be space between us, her expression conveyed: there must be a frontier across which the first tokens could be exchanged.
‘I didn’t know you were in England,’ I said after another silent interval.
‘Nobody knows I am.’ Her voice was breathless and strained. ‘Except Lizzie.’
‘Has Lizzie heard—’
‘About her brother? Oh yes. We had a telegram from Victor just before sailing. I’ve sent her to see her family in Ross.’
‘Then you’re alone?’
‘Yes. We docked this afternoon. Five days earlier than I told Victor to expect us.’
‘You … over-estimated the passage?’
‘No, Geoffrey. I did not over-estimate the passage.’
The implications of her remark assailed me. What had happened? What did she mean? ‘Won’t you come in?’ I stumbled.
‘I’m not sure. To be honest, I think I hoped you wouldn’t be at home.’
‘Why?’
‘Because then I’d have to return to Hereford straightaway.’
‘And you don’t want to?’
In her eyes I had my answer. She walked up the steps and halted beside me. Now her gaze was averted, her voice scarcely rising above a whisper. ‘I told my mother, and my father before he died, that life with Victor is a torment to me, that I can never love him, that he can never make me happy. I pleaded with them for help, for advice, for refuge at the very least.’
‘What did they say?’
‘They spoke of duty. They spoke of their honour and my obligations.’
‘As you did, when last we met.’
‘Yes.’ Now she looked at me, some dart of lamplight catching her eyes beneath the brim of her hat. ‘But that was before I watched my father die and saw what his code amounted to: a dutiful death and an honourable grave. They’re not enough, Geoffrey, not enough for me.’
‘Consuela—’
‘Tell me to go away if you like. Tell me to go back to my hotel and take the first train to Hereford tomorrow. You’d only be following the advice I gave you. And it was good advice, it really was.’
‘Was it? I’m not sure. And neither are you.’
‘But we must be sure, mustn’t we? One way or the other.’
The truth was that certainty lay beyond our grasp. But neither of us wanted to admit as much, dallying as we were with more unpredictable futures than there were stars in the sky above our heads. ‘Come inside, Consuela,’ I urged. ‘We can—’
As on that last occasion, three months before in Hereford, she silenced me with one hand laid softly against my mouth. But this time she said nothing and, this time, she had removed her glove. I felt the touch of her bare fingers on my lips more intensely, it seemed, than I would have felt even a kiss. Then I reached up, took her hand in mine and led her up the remaining steps towards the door.
HEREFORD POISONING CASE
Mrs Consuela Caswell was yesterday committed for trial on charges of murder and attempted murder at the conclusion of a five-day hearing at Hereford magistrates’ court. Mr Hebthorpe, prosecuting counsel, summed up the Crown’s case in a two-hour speech in which he reviewed all the evidence and contended that it represented the very strongest prima facie case against Mrs Caswell. Her jealousy had been aroused, he said, by malicious suggestions that her husband had been unfaithful to her. She had then set out to poison him in a ruthless and calculating manner, only to see her husband’s young and totally innocent niece consume the poison in his place. She had made no attempt to intervene and had allowed Miss Caswell to proceed to an agonizing death. She had then continued to hoard arsenic against the day when she might make another attempt on her husband’s life.
After a brief retirement, the magistrates announced that they were minded to commit Mrs Caswell for trial at the next assizes. Mr Windrush, her solicitor, indicated that she wished to reserve her defence.
Unruly scenes followed outside the court when Mrs Caswell was taken to a police van in order to be driven to Gloucester Prison. There was much shouting and jostling by the crowd. Objects were thrown and an egg struck Mrs Caswell on the arm. Three people were arrested. Mrs Caswell’s foreign origins and the wide respect in which her husband’s family are held in Hereford, compounded by the distressing circumstances of the case, are thought to explain the animosity felt towards her.
‘Are you going in to the office today, Geoffrey?’
It was Saturday morning in Suffolk Terrace, dull and grey with a fine drizzle falling beyond the windows. Angela, whose silence on the subject of Consuela’s hearing was still unbroken, eyed me in a way that was peculiarly hers: satirical, superior, playful as it might seem to others and had once to me. ‘No,’ I replied, turning the page of the newspaper.
‘I told Maudie Davenport I’d go with her to Harrods. The autumn fashions are in, you know.’
‘Really?’
‘And Maudie’s a great one for beating the crush. So I must dash.’
‘Of course.’
‘What will you be up to?’ Already she was halfway across the room, oblivious to whatever answer I might give.
‘This and that.’
‘Well, don’t overdo it, will you?’
‘I’ll be sure not to.’ My gaze, and with it my thoughts, reverted to the newspaper in my hands. I turned back to the page I had just been studying. Mrs Consuela Caswell was yesterday committed for trial on charges of murder and attempted murder. It had been inevitable, of course. So much evidence, so damning and incontrovertible – no other outcome had been possible. Yet the reality was worse than the expectation. A hostile crowd baying for ‘the foreign bitch’s neck’. An acrid splatter of rotten egg on her sleeve, worn like a badge of shame. Then the sullen company of two stern-faced wardresses on the jolting van-ride back to prison. The squalor and the horror of it all washed over my imagination. And there, at the centre, fixed by my memory, was the contrast that made it so hard to bear.
‘Querido Geoffrey.’ It was the phrase Consuela used that March night thirteen years ago, when she surrendered herself to me for the first time, her private, whispered endearment, the one fragment of Portuguese she permitted herself to employ. ‘Querido Geoffrey.’
I had banked up the fire and it flung in answer a golden swathe of light across the room, falling on the hills and valleys of the rumpled sheets, the mounds of the pillows, the columns of the bed-posts. And on Consuela. She was mine completely, to have and to hold, for one night only, for the immensity of time and the eternity of intent that it seemed to represent.
; ‘You’re beautiful, Consuela. I can’t believe how beautiful.’
‘For you, Geoffrey. Only for you. All for you.’
Her dark eyes, nervous and questing. Her still darker hair, falling and sliding through my fingers. Her lips, moving against my cheek as she murmured what I wanted to hear. Her hands, clutching and caressing. And her flesh, burning to my touch, golden to my sight. Our limbs entwined. Our bodies joined. Too much passion. Too much ecstasy. Too much trust for time to preserve.
‘I love you, Consuela.’
‘And I love you. Don’t desert me now, Geoffrey. Not after this.’
‘Never.’ I kissed her. ‘I will never desert you.’
‘I couldn’t bear it if you did.’
‘I won’t.’
‘You promise?’
‘As God is my witness.’ I kissed her again and smiled. I am yours for ever.’
Chapter Three
WHEN THE DOCTORS told Imry he could hope for no improvement in his condition so long as he inflicted the smogs of London on his lungs, he bought a cottage out at Wendover, on the scarp of the Chilterns, where he led a quiet fresh-air existence, doing a modest amount of work for the partnership whilst endeavouring to recover his health. We spoke every few days by telephone and saw each other at least once a month, so he was by no means out of touch. And besides, even if he had made no contribution to the work at all, I would still have sought his advice on other matters.
For Imry Renshaw is the best and firmest of friends, that rarest of gems in the seams of humanity: a genuinely good man. Never down-hearted, never reproachful, never less than those who know him hope to find him. He realizes that the effects of the mustard gas he inhaled in 1916 will never leave him, that his condition, in all probability, will slowly worsen, but he will not admit as much, to himself or to others. He faces all the missiles of life with cheerful defiance.
There were two reasons why I felt the need of Imry’s company that Saturday last October, when my wife and Maudie Davenport went to select their fifteen guinea gowns at Harrods. I needed to speak to somebody about Consuela’s plight. I needed to convince myself – or be persuaded – that there was nothing I could do to help her. Imry was the only person I could turn to, the nearest I knew to a disinterested observer. And he had one other recommendation. He alone knew how I had betrayed Consuela in the past.
I reached Wendover a little after midday and followed the familiar route from the station up a winding lane to Imry’s half-timbered cottage, Sunnylea. His housekeeper was on the premises and offered to include me in the meal she was preparing. As for my friend, he was to be found in an outhouse, planting bulbs in pots and puffing on the pipe he had been advised to give up. He had discovered the joys of gardening since leaving London and would regularly discourse, given half a chance, on the miraculous qualities of home-grown vegetables. But the role of carefree countryman did not fool me for an instant. He still looked thinner and hollower-chested than he should, he still seemed perpetually short of breath and any digging or lifting, when it came to it, would be done by another.
‘Hello, Geoff. Good to see you.’ In the warmth of his voice and his smile was the assurance that his words were sincere.
‘Hello, Imry. How are you?’
‘Not at all bad. Has Mrs Lewis offered you lunch?’
‘Yes.’
‘Splendid.’ He dibbled in the last bulb and turned to face me. ‘To what do I owe the pleasure, Geoff? This isn’t a scheduled visit.’
I grinned. ‘Spur of the moment.’
‘Really? Not the spur of something else?’
I shrugged. ‘Such as?’
He stepped across to the other side of the shed and pulled a newspaper from a pile of old copies wedged under a broken sieve. Then he folded it open at a particular page and handed it to me. It was Wednesday’s Daily Telegraph and carried a prominent report of the second day of Consuela’s hearing.
‘Ah,’ I said weakly.
‘Want to talk about it?’
‘Yes. I rather think I do.’
It was after lunch, by a sizzling log fire, over jugs of some local ale he favoured, that Imry and I discussed the case. At first, the relief of simply being able to speak of it was enough for me, but once that barrier was surmounted another lay in wait. Was she guilty or not?
‘It was only a hearing,’ Imry pointed out. ‘No defence evidence was heard.’
‘But if there’d been a convincing answer to the allegations, surely her solicitor would have given it.’
‘Obviously he didn’t think he could prevent committal, so there was no point showing his hand.’
‘That sounds like clutching at straws.’
‘You mean you think she’s guilty?’
‘What else can I think? You read the evidence as well as I did. Anybody who didn’t know her would take it for granted she was guilty.’
‘You’re right, of course. The patrons of the White Swan have already convicted her. Even Mrs Lewis has contributed her two penn’orth of condemnation.’
‘Well then?’
‘The verdict of the ill-informed is hardly the point, is it? I don’t want to trample on past confidences, Geoff, but you do know the lady, don’t you? And her husband. What’s your opinion – your real opinion?’
I thought for a moment, then said, ‘It’s conceivable Consuela might murder Victor. If any man could goad his wife into murdering him, it’s probably Victor Caswell. But poison is out of the question. She isn’t cruel or calculating enough for that. And there’s another objection. Those anonymous letters they found suggesting he was having an affair.’
‘What about them?’
‘She wouldn’t have cared, Imry. She wouldn’t have given a damn.’
‘No jealousy? No resentment?’
‘None. You can’t be jealous of somebody you loathe.’
‘But you haven’t seen either of them for more than ten years. Isn’t it possible—’
‘That they’ve changed? No. As a matter of fact, I don’t believe it is.’
‘So how do you explain the circumstances?’
‘I don’t. I can’t. That’s just the point. I don’t know enough to explain anything.’
‘But you’re wondering if you should try to find out?’
‘Yes.’
‘How could you?’
‘Speak to some of the witnesses, I suppose.’
‘Or to Consuela?’
‘It had crossed my mind.’
Imry leaned forward to stoke the fire. ‘Do you think she’d want to see you?’
‘After what I did, you mean? No, she probably wouldn’t. It might salve my conscience, but it could just as easily increase her agony of mind. Besides, no doubt her solicitor is competent enough. He’ll assemble a defence with no need of help from me.’
‘And if Angela came to hear you were trying to help her?’
‘There’d be hell to pay.’
‘So there’s everything to be said for leaving well alone?’
‘Yes, there is. It’s the wisest course. It’s the easiest course. But is it the right one?’
‘I don’t know, Geoff, I really don’t. If I did, I’d tell you.’
‘I suppose I hoped …’
‘That I’d have an instant answer? Sorry, old chap. This is one dilemma only you can resolve.’
I grinned ruefully. ‘Perhaps I should have resolved it a long time ago.’
Imry nodded. ‘Perhaps you should at that.’
What did I know of Consuela? What did I know of the woman to whom I had once sworn love and loyalty? Only what she had told me herself, of course. Only what she had allowed me to understand.
She was born in Rio de Janeiro on 3 August 1888, the youngest of the seven children of Luís Antônio Manchaca de Pombalho, wealthy coffee merchant and ship-owner. She had three sisters, but none of them, apparently, could rival the startling beauty of young Consuela Evelina. At eight she was sent to the Collège de Sion in Petropolis, to be educated and
refined by French nuns. Piety, decorum, application, delicacy and politeness. These were ingrained along with the language and literature of France and England, held to be incomparably superior to those of her native land. It was a regime intended to fit her for early matrimony and obedient motherhood.
In 1905, when Consuela was seventeen, her mother and one of her brothers took her to Paris for six months for a final polishing in the ways of cultured society. When she returned, she found that a new figure had appeared in her father’s business life, an Englishman named Victor Caswell, who was reputed to have made a fortune in the rubber plantations of Acre, vast tracts of which he owned. From that point on, Victor’s involvement in her family’s financial affairs and his courtship of Consuela proceeded in tandem. And Consuela, offered such a suitable and convenient match, felt she could not put forward mere dislike as an objection. They were married in Rio in October 1907.
Within a matter of weeks, Consuela made three horrifying discoveries. Firstly that she was unable to satisfy her husband sexually. Secondly that he was prepared to resort to the high-class prostitutes who abounded in Rio to obtain such satisfaction. And thirdly that he proposed to retire to England as soon as possible, taking her with him and thus away from the friends and relatives who were her one consolation.
I can only imagine the desolation of spirit Consuela must have experienced on being ushered into Fern Lodge, Hereford, in the late winter of 1908, and introduced for the first time to the family of which she had become an unwitting member. Hereford and the Caswells must have seemed unbearably grey and grudging after the colour and vitality of Rio. Small wonder that she abandoned herself to a secret misery and responded with total indifference to Victor’s announcement a few months later that he was to build a country house for them to live in.
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