Sonia stood up. “I’d love to see the gardens,” she said, oblivious of any faux pas. “You know, we never did get to see them last time,” she added, turning to the countess.
“Ah, your enthusiasm is to be commended. But I was looking forward to having a little conversation with you, Sonia. I’ve barely spoken to you, my dear.”
Sonia looked from the countess to Jack and then back at the countess, and then sat down.
The countess turned to Cecily. “Allow Jack to take you on a little tour. It’s hardly Versailles, but I think we’re making progress,” she said, smiling beguilingly at Cecily.
They walked across the lawn to steps leading down to another, fringed by wide herbaceous borders and swaths of overgrown wilting rosebushes. A gritted pathway crossed the second at right angles in the center, where an ancient-looking sundial stood, and, beyond it, a long pergola, festooned in creepers and trailers, and dangling tentacles like cobweb-covered hands. At the end of the pergola, next to an arbor, a tall black wrought-iron gate stood open on to the wooded hillside, where centuries of fallen leaves had made a thick carpet of the earth. Here, under towering beeches and pines, the brightness was diffused, the air cooler.
He said, “I’m sorry I was so late. I hope it wasn’t too much of an ordeal for you.”
“No, it wasn’t an ordeal,” she replied, walking on.
The sound of a motorcar’s engine drifted over from the other side of the valley, its horn honking loudly as it approached the last hairpin bend before the village. And when its noise finally abated the voices on the lawn were no longer audible. But the sound of the fair on the village green—a brass band and children shrieking—drifted up through the wooded dell.
“You know, when the house was first built there were very few trees here, on this part of the hill. Apparently one could see Linford and beyond, almost as far as the coast on a fine day.”
“This place was built for her, for your grandmother?” Cecily asked, glancing toward him.
“I believe so. I suppose she wanted to have somewhere to come back to, eventually. And all these pine trees,” he added, looking upward, “are a nod to Rome. She’d have no doubt moved the Roman Forum here if she could’ve done.”
“But she never lived here, until now.”
“No. She preferred to live in Rome, and Paris. It’s where all her friends are . . . or were. And”—he looked at her and smiled—“she’s not overly fond of England.”
“Why is that?”
He shrugged his shoulders, ran a hand through his hair. “She considers herself European, and having been an expatriate for so long, I think she feels somewhat estranged from English ways and customs. She finds people here”—he paused, pondering, searching for the words—“perhaps a tad judgmental, narrow-minded. She abhors snobbery, says England invented it,” he added, amusement in his voice.
He stepped from the pathway, pulling back overgrown laurel and waist-high ferns to reveal stone steps leading down to another path. And as he held back the branches and Cecily moved down the steps, she caught the pungent musky scent of fox.
“She’s had a such an interesting life,” she said, ducking cobwebs, stepping from the hard stone onto a deep brown carpet of pine needles and leaves.
He leapt down the last few steps, landing in front of her. “Yes,” he said, breathlessly, looking back at her. “Though bizarrely I don’t know a great deal about it. You see, we’ve not seen an awful lot of each other. She was always overseas and, well, I was here with my mother. I’m only just getting to know her . . . and about her life.”
“Must be queer,” Cecily said, glancing away, “to only now be getting to know each other.”
“I suppose it is,” he replied, turning and walking on. “She loves to speak about Rome, as I’m sure you’ve gathered this afternoon. And she loves to talk about Paris, and the old château, but she’s not too fond—seems almost reluctant—to speak of her childhood and early life. I imagine it was a sad time for her. She lost both of her parents so young, was left with no one apart from her aunt, who was more like a mother to her. Watch out for the holly,” he added, over his shoulder.
“Did you ever visit her in Rome?”
“No, sadly not. I saw her on the rare occasions she came to London, but she and my mother never saw eye to eye, and there was always . . . always a strained atmosphere. I used to think she blamed my mother for my father’s death.” He reached down, picked up a stone and, just as though it were a cricket ball, ran forward, described an arc and hurled it out across the valley.
“But that was an accident, surely?”
“Yes, of course it was. But I’m not sure my mother was my grandmother’s ideal choice of wife for my father. Her background was so different. Her father—my maternal grandfather—was South American, Argentinian.”
“I thought you said she hated snobbery?”
He laughed. “She’s contradictory, if nothing else,” he said, shaking his head. “No, my mother, or perhaps more specifically her father, were not the match my grandmother had in mind. He was an opera singer, or wanted to be. He had no money when he arrived here in this country—sang for pennies, by all accounts. His name was Virdeon Cazabon. Rather a good name for an opera singer, don’t you agree?” he said.
“That’s where you get your dark looks from.”
“Both of my parents were dark. I’ll show you a photograph later, if you’d like.”
She nodded. “Yes, I’d like to see.”
“I was born there, in Argentina . . . Buenos Aires. My mother for some reason decided that I should be born there and not in England.” He paused. “It was shortly after we returned here that my father died.”
“He fell from his horse?”
He stopped. “Yes, and not very far from here, as it happens. He was out hunting . . . it was January, the earth was hard . . . and his horse took a tumble. A rabbit hole, I believe. He was thrown . . . landed on his head . . . died hours later.” He turned to her. “Fate, eh?”
Cecily shook her head. “Fate . . .”
They continued on in silence down the steep path, deep into the valley and taller woods, zigzagging briars, thickets of holly, bracken and ferns. When they reached the dried-up mud of a stream, he said, “This was flowing quite magnificently at Whitsun.” And he kicked at the hard earth with the toe of his shoe. All around them, high above them, the great beeches loomed, cathedral-like, majestic and timeless, effulgent in the sunshine. Magical, Cecily thought.
They followed the path of the stream, spoke of incidental things: the new bridge planned for the ford; the cricket teams’ fixtures for the forthcoming weeks; and the entertainments planned in the village hall. Then Cecily told him of her wish to travel, to visit far-flung places, see cities and live in them, perhaps. And he told her of his wish to live in the country, in a place such as Bramley, and be settled and happy. “It must be marvelous to belong somewhere. To live in a place where everyone knows who you are,” he said.
She spoke of her father, the last time she had seen him, or the last time she could recall. And he told her a little more of his, adding, “My grandmother speaks very highly of him, of course . . . And now there’s only me.” He shrugged. “I have no relations, no cousins, you see. Quite a responsibility . . .” He spoke of his mother, briefly. She had, he said, suffered from melancholia all of her life, had had that artistic temperament. But with each year her depression had grown worse. He knew, he said, but he was away at school. “What could I have done?” he asked. “She longed for someone who had gone. She became more and more reclusive, hardly venturing anywhere toward the end. She wanted to go back in time . . . to sleep, that was all.”
Eventually, they turned and slowly climbed back up the hill. And as he held back the branches on the steps once again, as she passed by him, he said, “I’m pleased you came today.”
The countess appeared to be dozing. Mr. F
ox and Miss Combe—who had been on the point of leaving for at least an hour—were discussing a recent drowning in a nearby pond: the perils of bathers. Miss Dorland was quietly reading her notebook, and Sonia and Marjorie were nowhere to be seen. As Jack and Cecily sat down, the countess opened her eyes and smiled. “I’m afraid the Brownlow girls had to leave,” she said. “Their father’s chauffeur came to collect them.” She turned to Jack and said something to him in French.
He replied in English. “No, we went the other way, took the path down through the woods.”
The countess turned to Cecily. “You didn’t get to see my temple?”
Cecily shook her head. “Temple? No, I’ve not seen it.”
“I shall show it to you next time,” she said. She leaned forward and whispered, “It’s a very special place, a memorial to—” She stopped, turned toward the rector. “I’m sorry, what was that, the name you just mentioned?”
Mr. Fox appeared momentarily confused. He had been speaking about some new tenants at the farm on the edge of the village. “Ah, John Abel!” he said, remembering. “Yes, he and his family moved into Meadow Farm two weeks ago. Nice people, from somewhere in Suffolk, I believe. I was there earlier today and—”
“John Abel? Are you quite certain that was the name?”
“Oh yes, absolutely.”
“And you say they’re from Suffolk?”
“Yes, that’s what he said, that’s what he told me,” the rector replied, a little mystified. “A name you’re familiar with, ma’am?”
“I believe my aunt once knew someone of that name. But that was many, many years ago,” she replied, glancing away. And then she reached to the table and picked up her mother-of-pearl cigarette case. “Would anyone care for a small sherry?” she asked.
Chapter Eight
That night, Cecily dreamed of the Bambino Santissimo. She dreamed it came to Bramley, carried through the lanes and up the track to her house in a sedan chair, waited on by Mr. Fox and Jack Staunton, who said, “We have to get it back to Rome by teatime.” But the chair became stuck in the garden gate, and her mother said, “Expatriates always require a wide gate.” And when Cecily peered inside the chair, she saw that the doll was not a doll at all, for it was smoking a cigarette, and appeared to be . . . the countess.
When she awoke, she dismissed the dream, and then lay in her bed for some time, remembering the events of the previous day, working through it all once again, trying to recall the exact words and sequence of conversations. Had he said he was pleased that she came? Or had she dreamed that? No. He’d definitely said it: I’m pleased that you came. She could remember exactly where they were, could walk back to the very spot. And hadn’t he looked at her in a certain way? Had he not had that rather serious, concentrated look in his eyes? The same expression Walter had worn when he told her that she always made him laugh? She pictured Jack once again, standing in his white shirt, with that black smear across the front, holding back a branch. She could see the shadow of his beard, the line of his mouth, beads of perspiration glistening above his top lip. That beautiful lip . . . had it ever been kissed? she wondered.
She turned onto her side. The room was warm, already bathed in sunlight. A somnolent coo drifted in through the open window. She closed her eyes, took herself back twelve hours.
She had bid the countess goodbye at around six o’clock. Mr. Fox and Miss Combe had finally left, together, and the countess wished to go indoors, saying she felt the air becoming cool, though how—at around eighty degrees Fahrenheit—Cecily could not fathom. Jack said he would walk her home, and they had come by way of the eastern side of the house so that he could show her his motorcycle.
Around a gritted yard was a row of little cottages, a coach house and some stables; and connecting the main house to the coach house, another entire wing, less grand but easily as big as her own home, that Cecily had never seen.
“What’s in there?” she had asked, pointing.
“There? The game larder and pastry larder, lamp room and scullery, the china closet, and Mrs. Davey’s bedroom and sitting room. And the servants’ hall, of course,” he replied.
The yard led on to a lane, bordered on one side by a paddock, where a few rabbits sat about on the grass, and rotting hen coops and hutches butted up against a fence. On the other side was a pink brick wall, which Cecily already knew to be the wall of the kitchen gardens.
“And where does the lane lead to?” she asked.
“The cinder track? Down to the main road, eventually, at the very bottom of the valley,” he replied, pulling open the coach-house door.
Then he began talking about his motorcycle, mentioning all sorts of numbers and letters, and then more numbers, none of which meant anything to Cecily. Well, yes, she said, it looks marvelous. She had not known what else to say. I’ll take you out on it, he said, again. “But please don’t ask your mother, she’s bound to say no.”
They walked back by way of the house and the main driveway, and lingered there, at the top of the drive, before turning out on to the track. He said, “I meant to say to you earlier, I rather like your hat, what you’ve done with it—the flowers,” he added, gesturing to it in her hand. She had been embarrassed. But why? If anyone else, even Walter, had commented on any hat she’d worn, it would not have made her feel anything other than pleased to receive the compliment. She’d have smiled, said, “Thank you.” But instead, with him, she was momentarily speechless, quite unable to put together any words that made sense. She had stammered, said something disjointed and nonsensical about it being one of her sister’s hats, that it was Ethne who had attached the flowers, and that she didn’t particularly like it. And, just to prove it, she had pulled one of the roses out and thrown it into the rhododendrons behind her. He had stood back, hands in pockets, smiling, as though he knew, realized; so she had pulled out another and flung it across the driveway.
She shuddered as she recalled it.
They had sauntered down the track, stopping every once in a while, extending minutes . . . or had they? Had she been extending each minute while he had been wondering why she walked quite so slowly?
She turned over on her bed, her head in her hands.
“You know, you’ve hardly told me anything at all about yourself,” he said. “I’ve spoken about me and my family, added to which you’ve had to listen patiently to my grandmother, and to Mr. Fox’s ramblings—when he could get a word in edgeways—and to that awful Combe woman.”
She laughed. “There’s nothing much to tell,” she said. “I was born, I grew up, and here I am. That’s it, so far.”
He nodded. “Hmm. I like that. And it’s actually the from here I’m interested in.”
Had he said that? Was that what he said?
She turned onto her back, looked up at the sloping ceiling. And she could see them, there on the track, walking down the hill together, beneath that tunnel of branches.
“Where would you like to go from here, Cecily Chadwick? What do you wish for?”
She had pulled the last wilting rose from her hat and thrown it into the hedgerow. “I wish for happiness, of course. I wish for fulfillment, to do more with my life than simply marry, have children, grow old and then die. I want to see other places . . .” She stopped, looked at him. “And I want to write.”
She turned onto her stomach, buried her face in the pillow, moaning. “I want to write! Ugh! I can’t believe I told him that . . . I’ve never told anyone . . . no one knows.”
But what had he said? She turned onto her side once more.
“You want to write? You write?”
“Yes, I try to. It’s what I want to do, all I’ve ever wanted to do.”
It was what she wanted to do. It was what she wished for. She wanted to be remembered for being more than just someone’s wife, someone’s mother, or someone’s daughter. She didn’t want to have to marry simply in
order to validate her existence upon this planet. What good had that done her mother, or anyone else? Husbands made decisions, yes; they offered respectability, safety and, usually, a home, a lifestyle. But they also went away, they also died, leaving pale-faced widows and confused children, bereft and adrift; leaving a gap far bigger than if they had never been there. Marriage brought status, she knew that, but it also brought a sort of invisibility, anonymity.
“Do you allow anyone to read what you write?” he asked.
She shook her head, already rueful.
“Well, you must allow Sylvia to. It’d be good for you to get her opinion, wouldn’t it? She’s had perhaps as many as a dozen books published, I think.”
They reached the gate, and she hadn’t wanted to look at him, hadn’t wanted to in case he was quietly laughing at her. But she had—and he hadn’t been. He’d stood quite close to her, his eyes cast downwards, flicking the peeling paint from the gatepost. Then he’d looked up at her and said, “You know, you could call by tomorrow, bring some of your writing for Sylvia to read . . .”
“I’m not sure.”
“No, perhaps not . . . But you could call by anyway, if you’d like to.”
“Or you could call here,” she said, feeling bold.
“I could,” he replied, smiling back at her. “Should I?”
She nodded.
“Then I shall.”
They had stood there in silence, staring at each other, smiling. Neither of them had spoken for some time. And the queerest thing was she couldn’t now be sure whether that silence had lasted only a few seconds or some minutes. In her mind it was interminable. In her mind, it went on and on. And yes, she had been bold, forward in that look, which said, quite simply, she thought now, “I like you.” For surely that particular smile couldn’t have said anything more, could it?
She rose quickly from her bed, reached to the window and drew back the curtains.
“He started it . . .”
Yes, he started it. He had looked into her eyes, smiled, glanced away, glanced back, smiled some more; and then, finally, as she’d pushed on the gate, as the latch had dropped—clickety-click—he had slowly backed away.
The Memory of Lost Senses Page 12