by Rosie Thomas
‘I know. Don’t you say anything. Tell you what, come and have a walk. By the time we get back, everyone will have forgotten and I won’t have to do a big apology scene.’
Helen’s heart began to thump uncomfortably, but she kept her face expressionless. However badly he behaved, nothing seemed to affect his power over her.
They picked up their coats from where they were draped over the banisters and went out. A sharp wind was blowing and the sun was low in the grey-pink sky. A flock of rooks lifted noisily from the oak trees as they passed and flapped overhead.
‘Warm enough?’ Oliver asked. Helen nodded and they struck out down the lane away from the house. Oliver set a brisk pace, as if he wanted to put as much distance as possible between himself and the lunch party. After a moment he began to whistle, the same handful of notes over and over again.
Helen clenched her fists inside her pockets. She had barely spoken since they had left the table but there was a jumble of words inside her. She struggled with what she wanted to say. It was important to thank Oliver for his money, and to do it without letting her obstinate feelings for him distort anything.
In the end it was Oliver who spoke first.
‘You’re not angry are you? It’d be a shame to let it stop us liking each other.’
Liking you? I’m not sure about that, Helen thought, amongst all the other things I feel about you. I love you, and you do make me feel angry, and sometimes ashamed for you. Because of all that, I’m not sure if I do like you.
‘No, not angry,’ she answered, keeping her face turned away and her eyes on her breath clouding in the cold air. ‘Surprised. Relieved. And grateful, once I’d worked it out.’
‘Grateful?’ Oliver raised his eyebrows humorously. ‘I suppose that’s one way of looking at it. Lucky escape, and all that.’
‘Not so much an escape. It just means that I can go on doing what I want to do in peace, without having to worry, and that means a lot to me. I came today because I wanted to say thank you.’
‘Well, how very clear-sighted of you. I shall stop feeling guilty at once.’
For a hundred yards they walked on in silence. Something nagged at Helen, making her want to go on questioning him.
‘Why did you do it?’
Oliver sighed impatiently. ‘For God’s sake, I hate postmortems and heart-to-hearts about who did what and why. Can’t we just leave things as they are?’
He’s as embarrassed as I am, Helen realised, and subsided at once. She had said what she needed to, however awkwardly it had come out and however awkwardly it had been received. There was no point in pressing him.
Oliver resumed his whistling, then broke off and pointed across an open field. ‘Look. We’ve set up a fox. Can you see him go?’
Helen followed his finger and saw a tall red-brown shape plunge into the shelter of a little copse.
‘I’ve never seen one before,’ she told him, and he laughed incredulously.
‘You’ve never hunted?’
Now it was Helen’s turn to laugh. ‘Of course I’ve never hunted. Do I look the type?’
They had reached the top of a little hill and they looked back the way they had come. The chimneys of Stephen’s house were just visible among the trees.
‘Well, you’re missing out on the second most exciting experience in life.’ He grinned at her, then pulled her arm comfortably through his as they began the walk back. Helen’s fingers tightened imperceptibly on his arm. She was barely listening to what he was saying, the effect of being close to him again was so potent.
‘Hey, I’ve got an idea. What are you doing after Christmas? Come to Montcalm for a couple of days, help me face out the family party. You can follow the New Year meet, and there’s the Hunt Ball at the house as well. Yes?’
Helen’s first instinct was to say no, she couldn’t possibly. She had only the vaguest idea of what Montcalm could be like, but she was sure it would be terrifying. Then a thrill of bemused excitement shot through her. He was asking her to stay with him. He wanted to see her. Illogical, irrepressible hope bubbled inside her.
She would go.
Helen swung round to face him and skipped a few steps backwards down the lane. ‘Shall I? I will if you promise to brief me very carefully first so that I don’t put every foot wrong. My experience of stately homes is limited to lining up between the red ropes.’
‘Darling Helen, what can you be expecting? Footmen in powdered wigs and carriages at the door?’
She nodded so vigorously that the curls swung around her face. ‘Oh yes, at the very least. And four-poster beds, and tweenies bringing up hot water in enamel jugs.’
‘Too much television, my girl. So you’ll come?’
‘Yes.’
Oliver took her hand again and pulled her into a run. ‘Wonderful,’ he called over his shoulder. ‘Pansy’ll be there, of course, and Hart. You can make up the foursome.’
Helen almost stumbled and fell. She wished that the muddy lane would open up and swallow her.
How stupid. How absurd of her to have hoped for anything else.
Of course there was no point in hoping. Oliver wouldn’t come back to her. She had amused him for a little while, perhaps just because she was naive and ignorant of his world. And now that was over, and he was held by his fascination with Pansy. Helen was just part of the scenery for him, another figure to populate his crowded landscape. For a moment dislike overcame her, together with contempt for his self-preoccupation and complacency. And yet that wasn’t all of Oliver. He was much more complex than that.
Oliver ran faster and faster with Helen’s hand still caught firmly in his. Their heels rang on the metalled road and their breath clouded in the cold air. Helen felt a stab of pain in her chest and began to flag, but still Oliver drew her on.
Even caught up in her instant of dislike, her palm was glued to his. His electricity had never failed to arouse her, and she couldn’t have let go his hand to save her life.
Then they were at the stone gateposts and under the arch of oak trees. As soon as Oliver saw the house he stopped, with Helen gasping beside him. ‘Thanks,’ he said, not looking at her. ‘Come on. I’d better go in and make myself agreeable.’
He was just Oliver again, as full of faults as she had always suspected, and she still loved him because something within her always would. But loving him would no longer obliterate everything. Sometime, no matter how far off it was, she would belong to herself again.
Those of the party who remained were sitting around the fire in the drawing room. Teacups and newspapers were scattered comfortably between them.
Stephen, both hands moving expressively to make a point, was talking about the conflicts of love within the play.
Chloe sat a little apart, apparently engrossed in a newspaper.
Oliver went straight to Beatrice and kissed her on both cheeks.
‘Sorry I was so rude,’ he said penitently. ‘Does it mean that you won’t ever ask me again?’
‘Of course not. It’s a pleasure to see you all. We’re always here, Stephen and I, and you must come whenever you like.’
Across the room, Chloe folded up her newspaper and put it down. Then she stretched, cat-like, and looked at her watch.
‘If you’re ready, Helen, I think I’d quite like to get back.’
It was the cue for the party to break up. People began saying their goodbyes.
Stephen and Beatrice stood side by side in the lighted doorway to wave. They were laughing and Beatrice had taken her husband’s hand. Stephen hoisted Sebastian up on to his shoulders and the little boy flapped his hands excitedly. They were neatly framed by the dark shape of the house with its warm yellow windows.
Chloe spun the wheel sharply and her car shot forward, the headlights raking a long tunnel through the dusk to the gates. Only when they were past the stone eagles did she breathe out a single long breath. She had been gripped by a pang of jealousy so acute that she could think of nothing but getting away fro
m the house. Everything in it spoke of Beatrice and Stephen’s fifteen years together. Its walls were lined with pictures they had chosen, the worn, comfortable furniture had accumulated around them, and the rooms were full of the clamour of their children.
In her mind’s eye Chloe saw Beatrice sitting calmly in the middle of it all, her dark head bent over her sewing.
Suddenly it seemed that she had everything Chloe wanted.
Even though Stephen’s fingertips had touched hers as he guided her around the house, even though he had held her in his arms and murmured into her hair in the deserted kitchen, it meant nothing. He belonged to Beatrice.
Chloe thought of her own life without pleasure. Before it had been all self-indulgence, leading nowhere. Now, at Oxford, it was lonely and empty – except for Stephen.
And she wanted Stephen even more, now that his inaccessibility had been revealed. Suddenly he seemed more attractive than anyone else in the world, and more important.
Then there was Beatrice.
Chloe’s fingers tightened on the wheel and she stared intently ahead into the darkness. Could she … would she take Stephen away from her? Like a little dark fish the thought flicked out, then darted back into the sea of her subconscious. Gratefully, Chloe let it go. There was no point in pursuing it now, she told herself easily.
Beside her, Helen sat immobile. Chloe put her own preoccupations aside for a moment.
‘Did you say what you wanted to Oliver? You were gone a long time.’
‘Yes. He said I was very clear-sighted, and he would stop feeling guilty at once. And he said he hated post-mortems. He didn’t want to talk about it, either, I suppose.’
‘Simple for him.’
Helen sighed. ‘Then he asked me to stay at Montcalm, after Christmas.’
Chloe looked round, surprised. ‘No, really? Helen, you’ve just got to go. Think of how grand it’ll be.’
Helen smiled sadly. ‘I’d rather not. Chloe, I’m such a fool. I thought he was asking just me. But it’s to make up a party. With Tom … and Pansy.’
Chloe’s face flooded with sympathy, and her hand closed over Helen’s and squeezed it.
‘I told you,’ she said, trying not to make it sound too harsh, ‘not to think about him any more like that. Don’t hurt yourself.’
‘I know.’
After a moment’s silence Chloe said, ‘So you won’t go?’
Helen looked out at the hoardings and street lights of the city’s outskirts.
‘Oh yes,’ she said, almost to herself. ‘I’ve got to go. I can’t stop myself. But I’ll be okay. I think I understood something this afternoon. But for now, just to be near him is better than nothing. Can you understand that?’
Chloe’s thoughts sped back over the afternoon. ‘No,’ she said softly, ‘I don’t think I can. I couldn’t bear to stand meekly by and watch the man I wanted being possessed by someone else. But if you want to go, then go. Don’t let anything stand in your way. You must do what you want in life, Helen. You yourself. Believe me, it’s important.’
Helen was startled and faintly alarmed by the vehemence in Chloe’s voice. She could find no satisfactory answer.
Silence separated them once again as the walls and towers of the city closed around them.
Christmas
Six
Christmas that year was the saddest that Helen had ever spent. As always she and Graham decorated the tree on Christmas Eve, and then arranged the family presents beneath it. When they stood back to admire the effect, Helen saw too clearly that there were only three little piles. She slipped away to her room, but not before Graham had seen the tears in her eyes. That saddened her too, because she had been determined to stay cheerful. But there was a hollowness about the Christmas rituals that was impossible to varnish over. Too often the three of them found themselves sitting in silence, staring at the incongruously festive food and drink. At Christmas dinner only Graham wore the paper hat from his cracker and afterwards, instead of playing the word games which their father had enjoyed, they sat subdued in front of the mock-jollity of the television.
Helen had repeatedly put off the real decision about whether or not to go to Montcalm. She had thought that she could always invent an excuse at the last minute. But as the flat days after Christmas trickled by, she found herself thinking of it more often as an escape from the sad claustrophobia of home. Helen watched her mother carefully, and thought that she was beginning to recover. She was preparing eagerly for her new job, and some of the lines of tension had vanished from her face. Graham, more resilient, was busy with his own friends. But for Helen herself the house was too full of memories of her father, and it was empty now of anything of her own life.
It was with something like guilty relief that she looked up the train times for Montcalm, and then telephoned the number that Oliver had given her.
A suave male voice answered the phone and said, ‘I will find his lordship for you, if you will be good enough to hold on.’
Helen made an awed face at herself in the mirror of the hallstand as she waited.
‘Helen? You are coming, aren’t you? It’ll be an errand of mercy. This year’s family party surpassed even last year’s in awfulness.’
She smiled quickly at hearing his familiar drawl again.
‘I’ll be there. Can someone meet me off the train?’
‘Sure thing. Looking forward to it.’
Helen packed her suitcase in a state of nervous anticipation. She had very few clothes so it wasn’t difficult to decide what to put in, but she was afraid that nothing was appropriate for a Christmas house-party at Montcalm.
Twenty-four hours later she was stepping down from the stopping train at the little local station. At first sight the platform seemed empty except for a fat ticket-collector, then she saw a dark figure leaning against the wall of the tiny station house. The anticipation, which she had been trying to curb all the way from home, died in her at once when she saw that it was Tom Hart. He took his hands out of the pockets of his svelte cashmere coat and hugged her briefly before swinging her suitcase out of her reach.
‘I’ll take it. Welcome to Montcalm. Oliver’s hunting, so he asked me to come and collect you.’
‘Is Pansy here?’
‘Not till this afternoon.’
A flicker of acknowledgement, half humorous and half rueful, passed between them.
Tom’s car was out in the station yard. They drove along wintry lanes between black hawthorn bushes that gave occasional glimpses of frost-hardened fields. ‘What’s it like?’ Helen asked.
Tom sketched a quick gesture with a ramrod back and an imperious hand. ‘Very grand. Just wait and see. I’ve no idea what to call anyone, whether it’s Oliver’s old man or the under-butler. I just adopt the role of the bizarre American, so they’re all agreeably surprised when I know what fork to use and don’t drink the fingerbowls.’
‘That’s no help to me,’ Helen groaned. Suddenly she felt acutely nervous.
All too soon they were driving beside the long wall that enclosed the park of the great house. Tom turned in at the gates that Helen remembered from her visit with Oliver. She saw that there was a shuttered wooden hut and a turnstile beside the lodge and Tom nodded towards it.
‘Not open to the great public today.’
Ahead of them, strikingly defined on its low hill, was the house. To Helen, it seemed a threatening mass of windows, turrets and crenellations. It was an eighteenth-century monument to family pride, vast, assertive, and very slightly mad.
Tom seemed entirely at home. He spun his car sharply on the gravel approach and shot through an arch into a square paved yard. As he backed into an empty garage Helen saw a fleet of other cars similarly housed. Amongst them was Oliver’s black Jaguar.
Somewhere near here must be Jasper Thripp’s domain, with his basket of squirming beagle pups and his tack-room full of lovingly polished saddles. ‘An old ally of mine,’ Oliver had called him. Helen’s throat contracted as s
he remembered the day, and her stunned excitement at finding herself with Oliver.
Don’t think about that any more, she warned herself. Don’t think about it, or you won’t be able to endure this visit.
‘This way,’ Tom said easily, then smiled at her. ‘Don’t look so frightened. It’s all surface, you know. Doesn’t make any difference underneath.’
They were walking along a stone-flagged corridor, frugally carpeted, with bare white walls. Servants’ quarters again, Helen thought.
Finally Tom stopped at an open doorway and a rich Gloucestershire voice called out to them.
‘You’ve never brought her in the back way, Mr Hart?’
‘Quicker,’ said Tom and beckoned Helen in to meet a broad, rosy woman in a flowered overall. ‘Mrs Pugh’s the housekeeper. Wouldn’t you expect a Mrs Danvers figure, all black bombazine and massive key rings? You’re wrong for the role you know, Mrs Pugh. Luckily Mr Maitland is more the thing, or our whole expectation would have been dashed.’
Mrs Pugh grinned like a girl.
‘That’s enough. Mr Maitland is the butler, dear, and he’s one of the old school. He’s been with the family since he was a boy, and his father before him, and he doesn’t care to see standards dropping. But what can you do, with half the country traipsing through the house every other day?’ She looked up at the clock on the mantelpiece. ‘Now then, Mr Hart, don’t keep us here talking again. The Countess is waiting to see you both for lunch, and Miss Brown will want to go upstairs first.’
After a regretful backward glance at the cosy clutter of the housekeeper’s room, Helen followed Mrs Pugh through what seemed like a maze of corridors. At last a heavy door swung open and as they passed through Helen’s fingertips brushed against the green baize.
It’s really true, she thought in amusement, and then, do I belong on this side of the door?
The difference was obvious at once. The carpets here were thick and swallowed up their footsteps. The walls were hung with pictures, portraits and landscapes and sporting scenes all together, and there were carved oak chests and chairs with tapestry seats ranged like sentinels down the length of the lofty corridor.