by Peter Rimmer
Freya Taylor, now Freya St Clair, had given them the key to her car; Robert St Clair had given them the key to his cottage in the country where he was going to write his new book until he had to leave with Ralph and Rosie Prescott’s help in such a hurry. Rebecca had told Mrs Levy they were taking a drive into the country and would be back in time for tea, a statement the American woman, who was Rebecca’s chaperone while she was in Denver, barely understood. If the Americans had a time for tea, it was any time during the day. Mrs Levy and her family drank coffee. Good coffee from Brazil. Ralph seeing her look of bemusement had added the actual time of four o’clock in the afternoon which every Englishman and every Englishwoman knew was the time for tea.
They were truly alone. For the first time. In love, with eyes only for each other. Afraid to break the magical feeling that flowed between them by even holding hands. Mrs Levy and Sir Jacob Rosenzweig had no reason to fear the slightest impropriety.
Opening the cottage door into a room flooded with sunlight, they went to the big window on the other side of the room and looked out at the fir trees and hills, the slopes of green grass flowing in and out of the forest where Robert had once skied so easily despite his missing foot. The view of sun-drenched hills and dales marched across by tall fir trees, was to both of them the perfection of nature’s beauty. When Ralph opened one of the windows, they could hear a pigeon calling. There were other, beautiful bird songs neither had heard before. Birds only found in America. Birds not found in their native England or through the noise of New York.
In the small kitchen, Rebecca had lit the wood fire, putting on the kettle. This, they smiled, was definitely the retreat of an Englishman. On the counter, next to the kettle, Rebecca found a small wooden chest marked tea. Inside was finely dry Indian tea, the blend made and shipped to Robert by Fortnum & Mason in London. The aroma from the chest was delicious. The label on the chest said blended by Fortnum & Mason, London.
“God bless the English,” Ralph had said. “It’s just so civilised. Here is one problem solved living in America. We don’t have to drink their dreadful tea… And just look, Rebecca. A proper brown teapot made from clay. No tin teapot for Robert. Just look at this place. No wonder he thinks of staying in America. Just imagine the winter with the fire roaring, the trees out there hung with snow, the slopes covered from hill to hill in white. I think I too could write a book in this chalet… Even a tin of English biscuits. He’ll be back looking at all this.”
“Do you think the parchments exist?”
“Only Robert knows. When we’ve had some tea and biscuits we are going for a walk in the woods. It really is a lovely title for a musical. A Walk in the Woods. Full of romance. Of happiness. My brother is very clever don’t you think?”
“So are you, Ralph.”
“You are biased, Rebecca.”
* * *
When he had read the message, Ralph sat down hard on his office chair. He was recalled to England. Immediately. Under threat of dismissal. Rosie had already booked him a passage on a cheap cargo boat that was carrying some of their clients’ cargo over to England. She had spoken to the English captain of the ship. Ralph was to leave the next morning from the dock just outside his window. Summoned home and not in style… Someone had told his Uncle Wallace that he was taking instruction from a rabbi. This was not going to be jovial Uncle Wallace at the other end. This time he had gone too far. He was going to be stripped of everything. His job. His new home in America. His livelihood. But worst of all they were going to strip him of Rebecca. He had challenged the British establishment. That old fox, Sir Jacob Rosenzweig, had known what he was doing all along.
When Ralph phoned the Abercrombie apartment there was no reply. There was no reply all afternoon and evening or in the morning, right up to the time of leaving his office and walking up the gangplank on to the small steamship.
When Ralph sat down to dinner with the captain and the three other officers in the small cabin that felt more like the wardroom of a warship, he knew the game was over. The captain had been ordered to give Ralph passage: by his company chairman on the phone from England. They knew. For all intents and purposes, he was their prisoner. A man condemned. It was going to be a long, silent voyage for Ralph. He had broken the rules. Without rules, they had taught Ralph at his public school, the Empire would collapse: the unwritten rules were what held the Empire together. British business. The establishment. The rule of law. If one of their own broke the rules, their world would collapse. The whole tiered system of class from the bottom to the top. Fifty million people and the rules had created the biggest empire the world had ever seen. A quarter of the world population subjects of the English King – Emperor right across the globe. Every public schoolboy had had this drilled into his brain. Never ever break the rules or you will be thrown out of the pack.
Suddenly Keppel Howland’s expedition to find Harry Brigandshaw did not seem so distant. Ralph did not have to wait to hear his Uncle Wallace’s words, the one glass eye boring into his soul. He knew. There was no way any of them were going to let him change his religion. He was born into the Church of England. He was going to die in the Church of England. Sooner or later. Depending on God’s will, the same God of Abraham who Ralph knew was God of all of them.
When Ralph reached his minuscule cabin after the silent first meal he began to laugh. Soon he was laughing hysterically.
The whole ship listened as it continued to steam across the North Atlantic on its way to his personal cross where they were all going to stick him. He had tried and lost. They were too big for him. He was going to have to conform, like it or not. Like so many other times in his life, he was going to have to do what he was told. That or be ostracised to live alone somewhere far away in exile where no one would care whether he lived or died. A stranger. Just one poor lost stranger.
Standing alone on the deck of the ship the next morning, Ralph knew the day in the cottage would have to last them the rest of their lives. They would never stop loving each other for as long as they lived. The love they had would never have to die… In that one thought, was all Ralph had for comfort.
13
August 1929 – To the Manor Born
It was Genevieve’s fifteenth birthday, almost exactly a year after the last night of Happy Times that had changed her life so dramatically. This time she had extracted a promise from her father to take her down to Dorset to meet her grandparents which Genevieve thought was going to be fun: she did not even have a proper surname let alone grandparents she could claim as her own. He was so sweet and so easy to twist around her little finger.
“They don’t even know you exist,” said Merlin St Clair.
“Then they should. And you promised. I’m going to be a famous actress. Now that I speak properly why would they be ashamed of me?”
“Not of you, darling. Of me. For not marrying your mother.”
“You married to mother! What a giggle.”
“Your mother is a very nice person.”
“Never said she wasn’t. She was a barmaid for God’s sake. You’re a toff and I love you.”
“Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain, Genevieve. It’s not nice.”
“I’m sure they’ll love an unexpected granddaughter.”
“Father won’t be too much trouble. His mind drifts off most of the time. Finding he has more progeny won’t surprise him at all. Mother will be horrified. With me.”
“Then I’ll have to charm the old duck.”
“Don’t call your grandmother an old duck!”
“Then what do I call her?”
“I have absolutely no idea.”
“Uncle Barnaby thinks I’m gorgeous.”
“Of that, I have little doubt.”
“What about your sisters? You do have sisters. My aunts, Uncle Barnaby told me. One is widowed and lives with her in-laws.”
“That’s quite enough for one promise.”
“Oh goody, goody gumdrops. We are going. Next weekend. The
school is closed for the summer holiday. I’m free as a bird. You can take Aunty Millie if you want.”
“My mother knows nothing about Miss Scott either. She’s an actress.”
“So will I be. I like Aunty Millie. She makes me giggle. I have free tickets tonight for the Albert Hall. It’s Beethoven’s fifth piano concerto. I love being at the Central School. We are at the centre of things in more ways than one. We can tell gran we went to a classical concert. I took you. Should be very impressed… How old am I for gran?”
“Grandmother. She’s your grandmother and a lady. You are seventeen. Remember, I had to tell the Central School of Speech and Drama you are two years older than you are. They didn’t take fourteen-year-olds.”
“I look seventeen… Uncle Barnaby said I look eighteen and asked which one was my boyfriend in the class. He visited me at the Royal Albert Hall.”
“Barnaby is a cross I have had to bear all my life.”
“When are you going to buy a new car? That old Bentley is ancient. And it’s black. One of the boys’ fathers has a car painted silver. Very smart I must say… All right, father. I’ll do a deal with you. Your old Bentley 3 Litre with the hood down if we go to Dorset this weekend… I just can’t wait to see their faces.”
* * *
When Genevieve reached the small flat in Chelsea where her father paid for everything, she told her mother where she was going for the weekend. She was full of herself and forgot to talk in her normal East End of London accent. Instead, she imagined herself still with her father and his family and spoke to her mother in the new plummy accent she had learnt in school. Her mother looked horrified and slapped her across the face as if she was still a child.
“What’s that for, mum?” said Genevieve the plummy accent knocked out of her head.
“For talkin’ posh and being a bloody fool,” said Esther. “I know you can make your dad do what you want. So what. Where’re your brains? Everything we have here works and don’t cost a penny. You goin’ to that fancy drama school don’t cost a penny. Your fancy new clothes cost nothin’ not to mention your new plummy accent. Well, I don’t know about you but I don’t want to lose what I got. I don’t want to go back to being a barmaid and listening to rubbish spoken by drunks all night. I don’t want ever to work again, see. You make a fool of your father in front of his mother and father and he’ll hate himself: I know Merlin. You and I tucked away nicely where he can come when he wants and put on his slippers they’ll all turn a blind eye to. They don’t talk about them let alone run their bastards down to the family seat in the bloody country. That’s right, Genevieve. You’re a bastard. Don’t you forget and do that high and mighty on me. When something works leave it alone.”
“His brothers know.”
“Them’s different. That’s men among men. Barnaby was screwing that Tina Pringle long before she got rich. Did you know young Frank is your cousin? No, didn’t think you did. See, everyone knows but no one flaunts it in polite society. Leave your grandma out of this. She’s better off none the wiser. What Merlin was thinkin’, I don’t know. He can be a bloody fool too despite all his learnin’ at fancy schools. Use your common sense, child. Don’t rock the boat. We are all right, aren’t we? Better than you being Ray Owen’s kid and us living off sixpence from the government. See, I was married to Owen when you was born so they’d done give me an army pension but so small it wouldn’t buy nothing as it turned out. And yes I was pregnant with you by your dad, Merlin, when I married Owen. Thought it give you some protection not thinkin’ your dad give us all this. Merlin in the trenches just like Ray and he too could have got killed and then where was I? You make a fool of Merlin he’ll want to forget us.”
“I want to be part of his family. They are my family too.”
“One day when you’re famous. Maybe.”
“You think I’ll be famous?” With the resilience of fifteen, she was smiling again.
“Only if you keep your trap shut. Now go and ring your father and tell ’im you can’t go. Quick. Before the silly sod does something and messes up my life. See, I’m selfish. We all are.”
* * *
While Genevieve was on the telephone, trying to speak to her father and tell him her mother had bought theatre tickets for Saturday as a birthday present and being told by the operator the line was engaged, the Mauritania was docking at the Port of Liverpool after a smooth crossing from New York. Were it not for the sword of Damocles hanging over Robert St Clair’s head, it would have been a perfect four-day honeymoon.
Living in the country in England and the cottage in Denver, Robert had had no idea how famous he had become. Even living in the flat in Stanhope Gate he had mixed with his own class who considered talking about another man’s money or fame bad manners. Robert himself never even mentioned he wrote books. People would have thought he was bragging, which was not as bad to Robert as breaking any of the Ten Commandments.
* * *
They had reached New York by air with plenty of time to spare. The pilot and his navigator were trying to beat their own best time from Denver to New York. Rosie Prescott was waiting with the boat tickets. Robert wrote out a cheque to Madgwick and Madgwick for the fares. They all went to Fifth Avenue where the new Mrs St Clair enjoyed herself buying clothes, insisting she paid for them with her own money. Americans, Robert thought, were indeed strange. Robert went for an American-style dinner jacket with black tie and black shoes. The white shirt was soft not starched to the texture of cardboard down the front. He had brought his own front studs and cufflinks in the small suitcase he had taken on the plane. In the end, they had two hours to window-shop and forget their problem before Rosie drove them to the boat in the company car.
“Don’t wait and see us off,” said Robert. “We’ll be fine now. You’ve been wonderful to us, Miss Prescott. Did Ralph Madgwick explain my problem on the phone?”
“Call me Rosie. In America, everything is less formal. You are three weeks ahead of the RMS Olympic. I do hope you sort out the problem.”
“It seemed so trivial when it started. Poetic licence. Not any more… My word she is a big liner. I always have a feeling of fear looking up from the ground just below such a monster. Man shouldn’t build things this large.”
“Don’t be morbid, Robert. Come along. That’s the first-class gangway over there. Not this one. Can’t you tell looking at the people?”
“What’s all this snobbery? I thought you were American… We’ll be back, Rosie.”
“Not until the baby is born,” said Freya.
“Rosie doesn’t know about the baby.”
“Oh yes she does,” said Rosie.
“Do you know if Merlin doesn’t marry, this baby inside me now could one day be an English lord?”
“Best of luck.”
“Thank you again.”
“Go on. This is the right gangway. Up you go. The weather forecast is perfect for what that is worth. Have a lovely trip. Give England my love. How was Ralph with Rebecca?”
“We gave them the car and the key to Robert’s cottage on the ski slopes.”
Rosie Prescott went white, shook their hands formally and left.
“What was that last bit about?” said Robert.
“She’s in love with Ralph, you idiot.”
“How do you know?”
“The way she nearly dropped dead at the thought of her love alone in a cottage with another woman.”
“But the whole reason for coming here was about Ralph and Rebecca.”
“Doesn’t make any difference. When are they due back in New York?”
“The day after tomorrow. We’ll be halfway across the Atlantic.”
* * *
That night they had been invited to sit at the captain’s table which was when Robert first saw fame staring him in the face. Within the first five minutes, the people at the table were asking him about the parchments, everyone fascinated by how his family had stumbled on the story of Sir Henri Saint Claire Debussy. All the Am
ericans at the table, the women dripping with jewels, wanted to know the truth behind Holy Knight. Somehow every night for four long days the subject came up again, and again drawing Robert further and further into the mess, the imagined nightmare to become now real. The readers of his book had had their imaginations sparked more by the story of Robert’s great-grandfather having a silver chalice thrown at his head than the book itself. Should the public ever find out he had told them a blatant lie, they would tear him and his reputation to pieces.
* * *
As a writer he would be finished, he told himself as he finally hurried down the gangway on to English soil.
The first thing Robert did was find a telephone in the offices of the shipping company. The luggage was still being carried off the ship. From two small suitcases going on the plane in Denver they had grown to a cabin trunk the size of a baby elephant.
The first call he made was to Barnaby. It took the operator half an hour to put him through.
“It’s far worse than we ever imagined,” Robert said to Barnaby down the telephone. “You and I have to go down to Dorset and make our mother tell a lie. Curley is on a boat right behind us. He said he had accepted your written invitation to visit Purbeck Manor.”
“A bit belated but I did receive his acceptance. So what? Show him some of the forged parchments instead of sending them in the post.”
“We didn’t have time. It’s a monstrous task. Can’t be done. Bloody terrible idea of yours. This is all your fault, Barnaby.”
“Nonsense. You told Max Pearl the family story. Not me. You invented the thrown wine cup. So don’t blame me for trying to help.”
“I’m going to telephone mother now. To tell her Freya and I are coming home for a while.”
“Is she pregnant?”
“Of course. Why do you think we married in such a damn hurry?”