Diamonds Fall

by Rebecca Gibson

  They made it to the station within ten minutes. Annabel could already see the trap that had taken Daniel parked outside and she looked around frantically for some sign of him. There was none.

  The officer, who was still yet to identify himself, jumped off the horse with a thud, as his considerable bulk hit the floor and pulled her after him. They bypassed the main entrance, raised above the street by three granite steps, choosing instead a small back door. Annabel was led down a dingy corridor lined with five or six closed doors, each holding the name of a sergeant, before they reached one that read `Sergeant T. Link' and entered. As they crossed the threshold the floorboards squeaked beneath Annabel's feet. She immediately rounded on the officer.

  "You have to free Daniel."

  The officer laughed. "I'll leave your father to decide that one."

  "But he is innocent and you are supposed to bring about justice."

  The officer gave another hollow laugh. "Yeah, sure we are sweet pea. We are supposed to feed our families as well. That's what I'm doing. Wait here."

  He pointed to a low, wooden chair on the far side of a rickety desk and closed the door behind him. Annabel could hear his heavy footfalls echo down the hall.

  Finally alone, Annabel seized her chance and dashed out the door. She heard it click back into place and closed her eyes briefly, hoping the officer had not heard it.

  She had to speak to her father.

  As quietly as she could, Annabel ran along the hall towards the door at the end. When she reached it she darted outside and ran along the cobbled street, her bare feet slapping against the smooth stones.

  She thrust her arm out when she saw a cab roll past but it didn't stop. Annabel cursed under her breath and continued along at a steady jog, receiving many disgusted looks along the way as she fled into the more upmarket part of town. People crossed the road when they saw her coming, too caught up in their own selfishness to look past the ragged clothes and see one of the wealthiest women in the world, in desperate need of assistance.

  As she started up the hill that would inevitably lead her home, a couple of people got up the nerve to stop her, or try to, but Annabel shook them all off. She continued now at a faster pace, until she reached the top with burning lungs and searing limbs. With the manor now in full sight Annabel felt a touch of her old vanity creep back into her blood so she reached into her bodice, pulling out the hair comb which she twisted into her limp, greasy hair. She hoped she would be recognised just enough to allow her through the gates. She smoothed her torn dress down with her hands, noticing how much rougher they looked, the skin now dry and red, before glancing up.

  Looking upon the manor, Annabel realised she had never truly appreciated the grandeur of the place. She had called the building home for eighteen years but had never even looked at it until then, as she stood as just another spectator to the Hoddingtons' unachievable perfection.

  Taking a deep breath she quickly reached the set of gigantic, golden gates that shielded the world from the splendour they couldn't afford, whilst simultaneously trapping the wealthy family inside.

  Beyond the gleaming gates the walls of Hoddington Manor shone pure white. Hundreds of windows studded the surface, glistening in the dull sunlight like row upon row of shimmering diamonds, set against the majestic pallor of royal skin. White roses crept along the numerous pillars flanking the grand entrance, in such a way that proved dozens of gardeners spent entire days pruning them. The grounds around its walls were immaculate, dotted with impressive sculptures and fountains arranged with hundreds more carefully tended white flowers. These grounds stood in stark contrast to the acres of unruly meadows beyond them, used throughout the summer for hunting. Just on the other side of the gate was a small, one story house resided in by the team of uniformed gatekeepers.

  This was probably the only time Annabel had ever looked upon her home with anything longer than a fleeting glance and she was in awe.

  She stood on the wrong side of these gates for about five minutes, her hands wrapped around the golden bars in an attempt to see how she was supposed to enter on foot. The gates had always been opened as she approached before so she did not know the protocol when they were closed.

  A young girl in a black maid's uniform passed her with a basket of fragrant, fresh herbs and made her way around to the smaller, servant's entrance where a guard stood on the opposite side. Neither of them paid the beggar in rags so much as a look.

  Annabel took her lead and followed the unsuspecting woman. The maid quickened her step, realising within seconds she was being followed. The guard slammed the gate behind the maid with such finality it shook for a good few seconds afterwards. Annabel, hearing hooves falling gently behind her, glanced over her shoulder. Just crossing over the brow of the hill was the officer, Sergeant Link she assumed, remembering the sign on his door. He was closing in on her rapidly.

  "Um...hello, I um -" She began talking to the guard in a hurried voice, her mind fogged by exhaustion, her lungs still clamouring for breath. The guard studiously ignored her, his arms pressed to his sides, his body motionless.

  "Excuse me, guard. I need to get through to my house. Excuse me...I ORDER YOU TO LISTEN TO ME!"

  The guard flinched at her authoritative tone and his eyes flickered to her face. It was the only part of him that moved. They widened as they caught sight of the glittering hair comb and then sunk into thin slits as if he was disbelieving his own vision. He seemed to be thinking very hard.

  "As you are wondering, yes my name is Miss Annabel Maria Hoddington. I live here, please let me through."

  She employed her trademark air of impatience to make her case more believable. She clearly succeeded for the gatekeeper gasped. His eyes flickered back to the diamonds in her hair. They seemed to offer him the proof he was desperately seeking and his hands flew up to his mouth. The expression of his shock was so great and unexpected he swayed on his feet for a few seconds, as if he would topple over. He looked hurriedly around for someone to tell him what to do. When he found no one, he swallowed, his adams apple bobbing in his throat.

  "Miss - Miss Hoddington."

  The man sank into a low bow and then jumped, as if remembering for the first time the large gate standing between them. He immediately searched through his pockets, drawing out a large ring of keys that jangled in his trembling hand. Fumbling through them he eventually found the correct one and opened the small gate, embedded inside the larger. As she stepped through it, he bowed again and offered her his white gloved hand for assistance. She must have looked as tired as she felt. His crumpled expression as she passed him told her she didn't smell too great either.

  "I have been absent for quite some time and getting home in a prompt manner would be most satisfying," Annabel said.

  The guard nodded frantically, looking around himself again for someone to help him. He seemed torn between escorting his mistress to the house and staying at his ordered post.

  "It is quite alright," Annabel continued, noticing his internal struggle. "I can escort myself home and a sufficient bonus will find its way into your wages. Thank you. Oh and tell the officer behind me, my family are incredibly grateful for my safe return and they will happily provide him with a light lunch, should he wish to head around to the servant's kitchen."

  She smirked up at the officer who had just pulled up by the gate, his mouth hanging open at her insult. She waved before turning on her heel towards home.

  "No!" she heard Sergeant Link exclaim in an outraged tone.

  This situation being a much more familiar one the guard began his spiel, repeating a speech that was clearly used on all unwanted visitors, with an air of detached disinterest.

  "I am to take her into the house," Annabel heard the officer plead somewhat pathetically, his authority failing him. The gatekeeper repeated the exact same speech, obviously bored.

  "That is quite unnecessary, I assure you." Annabel called over her shoulder. "You see I have my own legs that work perfectly fine
."

  She heard the gatekeeper's muffled snigger, as if he had raised a hand to his mouth to hide the expression and she winked at him. He seemed taken aback by his young mistress's friendliness but quickly reassembled his impassive facial expression.

  Annabel employed her usual upper class tone. It felt strange now on her out of practice tongue.

  "I believe your duty was to return me safely to my house officer, nothing more. You have therefore fulfilled your brief. If you wish to stay, as I said earlier, by all means you may wait out here with the rest of the staff. I would extend you my thanks but frankly, it would be a lie. Good day."

  Sergeant Link's face fell into a vicious glare and Annabel smiled back at him as she walked further up the immaculate drive.

  Annabel had quite forgotten the magnitude of her home. Having survived in nothing more than a stable, the sheer size of this house seemed excessive to say the least.

  As she reached the entrance, time seemed to slow down.

  Stepping inside the grand foyer, her bare feet slapping against the marble, Annabel was surrounded by the perfumed scents of her illustrious childhood. There were gasps from all angles as the various members of staff caught sight of her, stopping in their tasks to register the girl silhouetted majestically in the door.

  One gasp in particular caught Annabel's attention more than all the others. A tall woman, dressed from head to toe in black silk, had stopped in the middle of the floor, her hand clutching her chest in shock.

  Annabel approached her mother slowly, as if unsure she was truly there. The elder woman had the exact same expression on her own, gaunt face. When they were within a few inches of each other she reached out, brushing Annabel's cheek with cold fingers. She drew in a shaky breath and did something that took her daughter (already on the edge of a meltdown) by total surprise; she drew her into her embrace, cradling her head against her breast as both of them collapsed onto the floor in a pool of black silk.

  Annabel breathed in the expensive smell of her mother's skin whilst the beautiful material of her tailored dress caressed her touch. Annabel sat as still as possible in the embrace of someone who she believed could keep her safe, terrified that should she move too quickly, she would wake up back in the stable.

  An unknown amount of time passed as the two women sat on the gleaming floor. Servants wiped their eyes at the emotional scene they had witnessed, before moving off down the many different corridors to discreetly continue their chores elsewhere. Lady Elizabeth pulled back slightly, holding Annabel's chin in one hand as she turned her face this way and that to look at it from every available angle.

  "I hope no one saw you looking like this," she tutted.

  Annabel found this disapproving person far more familiar to her than the motherly, sensitive woman of a few seconds ago. She noticed lines had appeared around her mother's mouth and eyes, as if from worry.

  "Yes Mother," she replied, her voice thick.

  "Right." Rearranging her face to one of complete composure and erecting herself with her former posture, Lady Elizabeth pulled Annabel up beside her, patting her hand absentmindedly. "I must contact your father at once and you must dress for luncheon. I'm sure you are quite exhausted but we must keep up appearances and your father would worry terribly if he saw you like this. You're too thin Annabel, it doesn't suit you."

  She rang a bell off to the left of her and bent forwards as if to kiss her daughter on the forehead. Just before her lips brushed the skin, she stopped and pulled back, wrinkling her nose. Annabel stepped away from her, embarrassed.

  Stepping back as well, with one last smile for her daughter, a smile radiating through her entire face, she turned and walked up the stairs. Annabel was escorted up the opposite set of stairs, a maid appearing as if from thin air to escort her.

  Annabel put one foot in front of the other in a trance, her limbs felt heavy and stiff from weariness and her skin tingled with the promise of an imminent bath. With her guard down her thoughts quickly fled back to Daniel, Patsy, Billy and Genevieve, wondering what could be happening to them at that moment. Hearing a rustle behind her Annabel glanced back, noticing another maid following her, sweeping the mud she was treading into the carpet. Annabel stopped.

  "I'm sorry," she whispered, bending down to help.

  "It - it's okay Miss," said the second maid, glancing uncertainly towards the first. They exchanged a glance. Annabel had never spoken to a maid before.

  "P-please you've - you need to dress for lunch," the maid stammered. She touched Annabel's arm thus stopping her from helping. "P-please Miss."

  "Oh...okay." She stood up, stumbling along the richly carpeted corridor.

  She noticed more maids and footmen all staring as she walked past, too shocked to bow or curtsey. They were looking down at Annabel's bare feet, running up her body to the tattered clothes and tangled hair. She had never noticed how many members of staff there were at the house and suddenly, an idea hit her. She turned around racing down the stairs after her mother, using a stock of energy she hadn't thought she possessed.

  "Mother - Mother!" she called, running up the west wing stairs and barging into the burgundy walled writing room that belonged to her mother. The elder woman was sitting behind a highly polished oak desk with her back to a floor to ceiling window, accessorised with red and gold edged curtains. Her head jerked up at the sound of her daughter's voice and she jumped to her feet.

  "Annabel! Why are you not - you were going to get dressed."

  "Yes." She looked down at her horrible clothes and bare feet. "I will but first, the place I escaped...the village I was taken to -"

  She broke off, remembering her mother knew nothing of the last few weeks of her life. She waved a hand in front of her dismissively. "I'll explain it all after lunch, or at lunch - whichever. Well, I escaped with some friends that helped me while I was there -"

  "Annabel, please. You're over exciting yourself."

  "Listen Mother! Please. When the police shot Daniel - I need to talk to father the second he gets in because he is innocent, and what is happening to him is barbaric - but there were two people and a baby, their horse bolted."

  "Annabel let's discuss this -"

  "Later? No. In fact, whilst you're writing to father write to the station, Daniel needs to come to dinner tonight, I simply cannot have him sitting in a prison cell. Patsy, Billy and Genevieve, they need to be found and brought here, they could live in the house. In my wing of course. Billy's amazing with horses, I'm sure he would help out. People have been pretending to be relations for years, we will just say they are cousins and be done with it. The staff, if they dispersed around town, we could find them in a matter of minutes."

  Her mother looked at her as if she were deranged. She walked over to her, a scared look on her face. It was as if she were approaching a horse that could bolt at any moment.

  "Annabel you've clearly had an ordeal, you're in shock. Please just go and change."

  Tears of anger fell from Annabel's eyes.

  "Are you really that heartless? Daniel can't stay in prison! I don't even know what happened to the others. They are the reason I am still alive Mother-"

  "Don't - don't say things like that Annabel."

  "It's the truth. Please help them. For my sake, help them."

  "I'll do what I can child but you must dress before your father arrives." She fingered the course fabric of Annabel's ripped dress. "Make sure the maids burn this thing, it's beyond vile."

  Annabel smiled slightly but without much humour.

  "Yes Mother. Please talk to Father before I come down, he must free Daniel and we must find the others."

  "I'm sure he'll do everything he can," she looked slightly to the right of Annabel, towards a maid who had run in after her.

  "Take her to her room, she must bathe. And make sure she rests before you bring her down to luncheon, she is quite beside herself."

  Patting Annabel's cheek in a slightly disinterested way she walked past her - wiping
her hand as she did so - and placed the letter she had composed into a crisp envelope. "And see to it that Lord Hoddington gets this within the hour."

  "Yes Ma'am."

  The maid gave a little curtsey, taking the letter and passing it to a nearby footman, leading Annabel once more up into the east wing.

  Annabel walked up the stairs with a feeling of foreboding. It was almost as if she were walking towards her own prison, somewhere she would be polished and pruned, ready to be placed back on display as soon as possible. Her parents' best business asset had returned and it seemed they were anxious to forget the past few weeks had even occurred.

  Once in her old bedroom Annabel glanced around, taking in the familiar sights. The Fleur-de-lis patterned wallpaper was still exactly as it had been when she left, matching the gold colour of the curtains draping around the tall window and queen-sized bed.

  As Annabel walked further into her past, she ran her fingers lightly over the mantel of an elaborately carved marble fireplace that still smelt faintly of smoke, although it had been freshly laid at least a dozen times since she had been gone.

  Breathing in the expensive smells she had grown up with, Annabel continued slowly towards the window. Peering out over the distant forest she stretched her hand towards it, thinking of Daniel's tender touch on her skin. Her fingers found only the cold glass which fogged beneath her touch, leaving a ghostly imprint when her arm fell back to her side.

  "Your bath is ready Miss."

  Annabel jumped, startled out of her daze and made her way into the adjoining room. It was a strange feeling being back in these walls. The rooms hadn't changed since she was last there. She could even still smell the perfume she had worn that final morning.

  She stepped off the soft carpet and onto the heated tiles in the bathroom. The fire was raging in the fireplace, filling her with a kind of warmth she hadn't felt in weeks.

  Tugging the ill-fitting clothes off she heard a distant clatter and looked down, jumping as she stared directly into Daniel's eyes, forever immortalised in his craftsmanship. Annabel bent slowly and walked back into her bedroom, as if in a trance, where she placed the carving in her bedside cabinet. When she reappeared in the bathroom the maids ceased their conversation immediately. Two maids rushed forwards with a warm cloth, cleaning off the worst of the mud and grime from Annabel's feet and legs before she was asked to step into the steaming water. She entered the bath tub slowly. Her skin, now unused to such luxuries as hot water, turned red as soon as it hit the water. Once she was fully immersed Annabel sighed as the warmth crept into her aches, soothing them almost instantly. She hadn't realised just how fatigued she was until the water began seeping into her muscles. She felt the dirt and sweat slide out from her pores as perfumed soap was lathered into her skin and hair.