The Glass House

by Beatrice Colin

  “Antonia?” He was at his door, frowning, his eyes bluer than ever in the morning sunlight.

  “Sorry,” she said as she tried to lift the bike back up again. “If only I weren’t so clumsy.”

  He flinched as he took the handlebars from her.

  “Come back inside,” he said softly. “I have something to show you.”

  It was a painting, but like no other painting Antonia had ever seen. A woman holding a box. But the figure was broken up into a series of painted planes. The box contained an assortment of objects, so abstracted it was hard to work out at first what they were.

  “It’s called Heirlooms,” Henry said. “You’ve seen cubist paintings before, I expect, by Braque or Gleizes?”

  She shook her head no.

  “Is that a ring?” she asked, pointing out a gold elongated shape.

  “A ring? No,” he said. “It’s a cuff link.”

  Her heart began to thump, her head to throb. The painting was a portrait of her, all fractured and contradictory, with a box of stolen things weighing down her lap. How did he know?

  “I was going to try and exhibit it,” he said. “But now I think I would like you to have it.”

  “That’s very kind,” she said, referring to the painting. “But really, you shouldn’t give your work away. I shall buy it instead. At your next exhibition.”

  Henry didn’t put up a fight, he didn’t plead or beg or coerce. In fact he let it go quite easily. They both stared at the painting for a moment, and then he turned to her. The light from the window revealed the crags and crevices, the slow slide of age. His eyes sought hers. No one knew she was here, no one was watching, no one would ever know what intimacies passed between them. His hand reached across and took hers, the skin soft and warm.

  “Antonia?” he said. “Why don’t you come with me?”

  “Where to?” she whispered as if someone were listening.

  “Paris,” he said.

  “Paris?” she repeated. The word filled her mouth with hot breath and thrill. She saw it all; a small flat in the city with a view of the tower, the smell of linseed oil and varnish, the taste of red wine in her mouth. How would it be to run away, to bolt, to escape her marriage, her responsibility, her situation? To leave everything behind, to start again? She was breathing faster, her hand trembling in his.

  “It’s just a thought,” he said, and she could already sense his growing hesitation.

  “An excellent thought,” she replied.

  He smiled, then raised her hand to his mouth and kissed it. She could feel the heat of his breath on her skin and bit her lip to try to stop the giddy spin of her heart. She moved closer, she closed her eyes, her mouth sought his and found it.

  Henry’s body was unlike Malcolm’s in every way. The hair on his arms and chest was curly and dark, his torso was hard and lean. His fingers were beautiful, long and elegant; if only she had a pencil. And the strangest thing of all: They seemed to fit, his mouth on hers, her shoulder in the crook of his arm, the length of her back into the curve of his chest and belly. She felt then, as she lay on his single bed, that she had never been truly naked before.

  The ferry blew its horn, and its bass note reverberated deep within her. Henry stood on the quay, raised his hand, and gave her a single salute. As she watched, he grew smaller and smaller until she couldn’t make him out anymore. The lights of Gourock were coming on, specks of brilliant orange against the dark of the approaching night. Where had the day gone? One moment it was morning, the next late afternoon. She could still taste his skin: peppercorns and cedar shavings. Why shouldn’t she go to Paris? The idea was terrifying, fantastic, wonderful. Why not? For a moment she watched the soar of a gull overhead and felt the same weightless glide. Then she turned and faced forward, watching the peninsula rise up, black against the torn colors of the setting sun.

  With the dusk came doubts. What would become of Balmarra? How would Malcolm cope? And Cicely and Kitty? The heady burst of elation she had felt was already starting to dissipate. She couldn’t just bolt, at least not now. Even before they docked, she had changed her mind. She suspected that Henry knew she would. He hadn’t, after all, made any firm arrangements. Maybe he saw what she couldn’t, that her cage was of her own design.

  It was night by the time Antonia returned to Balmarra. As she climbed the steps she could see Malcolm in the drawing room filling out the crossword, the evening unfolding like all the others that had been and those that were still to come. She was suddenly angry, furious in fact, with Malcom and with Edward Pick and his burdensome legacy, and so she turned on her heel and headed back down the steps, down the driveway to the glass house. Inside, her eyes took a minute or two to adjust. An orange had been left on a small table in the optimistic hope it would ripen. She picked it up and held it in her palm. It was as small and hard as a golf ball and would never turn from sour to sweet. Then she heard a flapping sound far above. A small bird was trapped in the apex of the house, its wings in a blur as it banged the glass.

  First she took the pole hook and opened all the windows; then she filled a bucket with cold water from the tap. The thought passed through her mind that some of the plants were rare and therefore could be valuable, but there was no time to go down that route. Getting them ready to sell might take months to orchestrate, and she would have to keep the boiler stoked and pay the coal man in the meantime.

  The first bucket released a huge cloud of steam and the smell of hot metal and soot, the second just the hiss of smoking coal as the fire in the boiler went out. The third covered the heap of coal in the cellar with a sheen of moisture. It was done. She wiped the tears from her eyes as she replaced the bucket next to the water butt; for years this had been her world. As she walked past her roses she felt like a murderer. How long would her plants last without heat? Not long, she suspected. And yet there were other, hardier roses that they could plant outside.

  The money she saved from heating the glass house would pay for Kitty’s school fees. And for a young woman, an education was more important than a rose garden, wasn’t it? She paused at the door and listened. The flapping had stopped; the bird had found an open window and flown away.

  20

  Cicely stayed in bed late, not rising to get dressed until noon. She had barely slept all night. What had happened, or not happened, with Lorimer kept her awake, and she replayed the scene in her head, looking for another possible interpretation. But there was none. She rolled over in her bed and covered her face with her sheet. She was a married woman, a mother. What had she been thinking?

  Now that Lorimer had made an offer for the Snow Tree, she could start making plans to return to Darjeeling, to her husband. She tried to summon up George’s face, his voice, his laugh, but the images, the memories, the affection, were becoming blurred around the edges. How long had it been since he had written? Two months? Did he ever think of her? She must write and tell him her news. But how could she explain where the Snow Tree came from when she didn’t know the answer herself? And Lorimer’s generosity? He might suspect. He certainly wouldn’t be happy about it. In her defense, she had found a solution that suited everyone: George would have enough money to continue the expedition, and even though he would legally own it, his sister could remain at Balmarra for as long as she wanted. If Antonia could pay Kitty’s school fees until they could afford to do so, then Kitty could stay at school. All was well.

  And yet, back in India, life would be so empty without her daughter. Maybe they would move back to town? Or maybe they would move away, to Simla or Kiarighat, where no one knew them and they knew no one. But how long would it be before the next expedition, before the money ran out again? They had lurched from one crisis to the next for years. Now that she knew about Jane F intry, she wondered if her marriage would ever be the same. An image of Lorimer’s face came unbidden into her mind. No, she told herself, she must leave this place as quickly as possible before she did something she might regret.

  The house
was quiet—it seemed everyone was out. The night before there had been a hard hoarfrost, and even though the fires were lit, it was so cold you could see your breath inside. She would not miss the cold, the damp. It was then she noticed that something had changed in the air—an absence, a silence. Cicely pulled on her coat and headed out to the glass house to check on the seedling. The door to the glass house was lying open. Young Mr. Baillie was standing at the far end, his head hanging forward. Inside, instead of condensation, sheets of ice misted the glass. The gardener turned when he heard her approach, but his face revealed nothing.

  “Why is it so cold?” she asked.

  “The furnace,” he explained. “It must have been out all night.”

  “What?! How can that be?”

  He flinched slightly. He was angrier than she first realized.

  “I stoked it up around six last night. Someone’s been in after and thrown water on it. Come and see.”

  Sure enough, at the bottom of the stairs the boiler sat in a pool of dirty water. The fire was out.

  “Couldn’t you light it again?”

  “Have to wait for the coal to dry first,” he said. “It will take days.”

  “Where’s the seedling?”

  He led her back up the stairs to a low table at the back of the glass house. Her breath rose in white clouds; her cheeks stung pink. The seedling looked scorched and brown. All the bright new life, the tiny white leaves, was gone.

  “The frost got it,” he said.

  “Can you rescue it?” she asked.

  He sighed, then shook his head.

  “Nothing I can do, I’m afraid.”

  “Aren’t there any more seeds?”

  “I planted them all. Only one germinated. I’m sorry.”

  Cicely let out a small involuntary cry. She closed her eyes. If only she could open them again to a world where all was right. This was her divine punishment, clearly, the price of her impulsive thoughts. Now once again she was back where they started.

  * * *

   Antonia sat on the bench at the top of a small col. She not been back since they had shown Cicely the spot just after she and her daughter had arrived. A paddle steamer puffed its way up the loch below, leaving two frills of foam in its wake. The woodlands across the water looked like a painting, each tree a daub of color. The trees were their most glorious at this time of year, their leaves gold and copper and terra-cotta, a brief precious show before the winds blew them all away and winter came.

  That morning a parcel had arrived from the India Office. It held, she suspected, George’s things. What if he was dead? What if her optimism had been misplaced? She had stashed it in the hall cupboard beneath a blanket. Now she shivered and pulled her red cashmere scarf a little tighter around her shoulders. There was a metallic taste in the air; there would be rain or possibly snow before dusk. Someone was coming up the path, her husband, she could tell by the heavy intent of his footfall, not quite a walk but a stomp.

  “Where have you been?” he asked.

  “Why?” she replied.

  “The hothouse boiler’s been sabotaged,” said Malcolm. “I’ve a good mind to call the local constable.”

  “Please don’t do that.”

  “And why not?” he asked.

  She sighed.

  “Because I did it,” she replied.

  He shook his head.

  “My dear Antonia, what is wrong with you?”

  “Me?” she replied. “Nothing. And you? Anything you’d like to tell me?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

  It was all becoming absurd, Antonia thought. Did he really want her to spell it out? It seemed so.

  “Have you been seeing another woman?” she asked. What was the point of tiptoeing around?

  “It’s not what you think,” he replied. “I know that sounds like a cliché, but in this case it’s true.”

  He hadn’t denied it. That, in a sense, was a relief. She didn’t want to argue when all she had as evidence was a receipt for a drink in a hotel. And yet the moral high ground, she discovered, did not give her any sense of triumph at all.

  “Actually, on second thought,” she said, “I’d rather not know.”

  Malcolm’s mouth was turned down at the corners. He sat down beside her.

  “The thing is, I had the whole thing in hand,” he said softly.

  “What are you talking about?”

  He pulled a letter from his pocket and handed it to her.

  “It’s from your father’s solicitor,” he said.

  “Really? I thought his affairs were all sorted out.”

  “Sadly not,” said Malcolm. “As I’ve told you already, why did you think George’s wife came here?”

  She turned on the bench to face him.

  “But he left it to me,” she replied. “Balmarra is mine, isn’t it?”

  “I have no idea anymore,” he replied.

  21

  Antonia stormed into the guest bedroom without knocking. She had mud on her boots, and her hair was springing out of its pins. Cicely was standing in her undergarments.

  “Is it true?” she demanded. “You only came here to claim the estate for my brother?”

  Cicely pulled her day dress over her slip and faced the mirror. She had been expecting this moment for weeks, and now, finally, here it was. Remain calm, she told herself, don’t react. Antonia noticed the letter from the solicitor that was propped up on her sister-in-law’s bedside table, snatched it up, checked the sender’s details, and then threw it down again.

  “I had grown”—Antonia said, then swallowed—“to like you. I had thought of you less as a sister-in-law and more as a friend. I gave you and your daughter everything I possibly could.”

  “I know,” she replied.

  “I put the boiler out to save on coal, to use the money to pay the school fees.”

  So Antonia had killed the seedling. Cicely smiled. How ridiculous it seemed, one action that ruined the next.

  “It’s not funny!” Antonia yelled.

  Tears were welling up in her sister-in-law’s eyes. Cicely laid a hand on her forearm. She shook it off.

  “What are you planning to do with Balmarra?” Antonia asked. “Sell it, I suppose. I can’t imagine George wants to live here.”

  Antonia had answered her own question. Now, Cicely realized, she could go home. Springtime in the mountains was beautiful, snow on the high peaks, crocuses and primroses in the forests. She would ride through the foothills again, through the orange groves and tea plantations, breathing the fragrant mist that rose up from the valleys. It would look, feel, smell the same as always. It would be she who had changed.

  “Have you heard from my brother recently?” Antonia asked.

  “Not recently, no,” she replied. “I’m sure we will soon, though.”

  There had been no telegrams from George for some time now. And yet she wasn’t worried. Out in the field, communication was difficult.

  The day before she had decided to send a telegram. As usual, there was a queue in the post office. It had seemed a good idea at the time, but once she had a pen in her hand and a blank sheet in front of her she had no idea what to say. Words came into her head, but they were all the wrong ones. “Where on earth are you?” or “How could you do this to us? Stop.”

  “Mrs. Pick?” the clerk asked. “Are you all right?”

  She didn’t want to break down, not there in a place where customers were buying stamps and postal orders.

  “Perfectly,” she said, pulling her face into a smile. “Good day.”

  She hadn’t sent a telegram.

  “You know George,” Antonia said. “It’s what he does! He’ll turn up again soon. But you know, I’ll never forgive him for this. Never.”

  And then, with a slam of the door that made the whole house reverberate, she was gone, the red cashmere scarf discarded in a heap on Cicely’s bed.

  * * *

   The storm came in the mi
ddle of the night, the wind howling around the gable end and shrieking down the chimneys. By morning it hadn’t subsided; several trees were blown over before lunch. The winds hit the Clyde Estuary hard; the tide was so high it damaged the boats in the shipbuilders’ yards and blew over a couple of cranes. The esplanade at Fairlie was washed away, while at Port Glasgow the river burst its banks and flooded the town. At Balmarra, huge waves crashed around Karrasay, making it an island once more. The driveway was strewn with branches and leaves that had been ripped from the woodlands.

  Despite the storm, the meeting was in the Argyll Hotel at eleven. Malcolm would take Antonia in his motorcar; Cicely would ride with young Mr. Baillie in the pony-and-trap. Cicely had the decency to wait until Antonia and Malcolm had eaten breakfast before coming downstairs and eating her own. Once she was dressed, Antonia stood at her bedroom window and stared out across the loch. The water was almost black and flaked with white. For how much longer would this view be hers? Everything she had thought solid was now air—her home, her marriage, her future. She thought briefly about her brother, about how he sent his wife rather than come himself. She hadn’t opened the parcel yet. And then she thought about Malcolm. Was he still having an affair? Maybe she couldn’t blame him.

  A knock sounded on the door, and then it opened. Cicely Pick stood there in the clothes she had arrived in, her brown coat with the rabbit fur at the collar and wrists.

  “Will you come for a walk with me?” she asked.

  “With you? Now?”

  “There are some things I want to tell you,” she said.

  The glass house was as cold as a morgue. The leaves of the palms and the fruit trees were brown at the edges. The iron pipes were silent, but another bird that had flown in, a blackbird, and it sang loud and clear high up in the roof of the dome before finding an open window and flying away.

  “I just wanted to say that I tried,” Cicely said. “And I was almost there.”

  Cicely told her about the envelope in the book, about the seeds and the illustration, about the Snow Tree and how Jacob had grown one single plant there in the hothouse.