I returned to finish my school years, and Laurence to his law studies. But Edgar abandoned his university education, deciding he needed an immediate income, and war had been convenient. I was sixteen when Edgar left for officers’ training, and not quite eighteen when we received the telegram advising that he had gone missing in action somewhere south of Armentières in France, during a ferocious German offensive that took near one hundred thousand of our British men in less than a month. “A frightful mess,” said the reporter in the newspaper. Peggy wept, Bert buried his sadness in his tasks, Mother became ill, Laurence thought it morbid to remain in mourning, and I numbed myself with memories and disbelief. I took the news badly, to say the least, my sorrow relentless for those first weeks: dreaming nightly of our times as children and Edgar’s return and waking each day to the same empty rooms that reminded me he was gone.
As our estate finances were dwindling, it was necessary I join the workforce. I moved to a cheaply rented unit in Manchester. Mother’s connections saw me employed at the newspaper to sell advertising door to door, before I advanced to the position of writing copy for department stores and shop owners and my aptitude for illustrating was discovered. The work, which was writing such phrases as “delight the senses” for ladies and “for the professional man” alongside such drawings as suits, soap products, and smiling women, was something I had accepted as my future. And while sketching the wildlife and scenery around the Lakelands had been a favorite childhood pastime, I did not hanker for an illustrative advertising career. I simply yearned to be home to run the house and manage the tenanted farms as my grandfather had done, to plough the earth myself, to build a stable full of horses that would perhaps be shown or sold.
However, I had already accepted that under the terms of inheritance, which saw Laurence next in line to inherit Lakeland Manor, as well as the state of our labor shortages and unprofitable farming lands, I might not have that option.
After Edgar’s disappearance, I tried to comfort Mother, but she preferred the confines of her rooms and the company of tea and medication, attempting to return as she had been, which she never did. Her headaches worsened, and her nerves weakened as time wore on, which often left her unwilling to leave her villa.
The family was badly broken. But it would take retrospect to realize that it was barely together in the first instance.
CHAPTER 3
1922
It was unlike Mother not to attempt an immediate inquisition, but the mention of Edgar by the Frenchwoman had severely affected her. She had grown smaller and paler before my eyes. When she clutched at her chest, I rushed to her side. Mariette had picked up her child and made for the foyer. I glanced in her direction as she left, her head held high and lips pressed together, seemingly without regret at her own words, but she was acute to have seen the effects of them at least.
I rang the service bell for Peggy. Mother stood up unsteadily, and as I made to help her, she shook her head in the direction of Mariette, who had by that time exited the front door. Mother leaned so heavily on me I half carried her back to her room. She turned to me as we walked and gripped my arm hard. “She’s lying.”
As wary as I was also, I would need to hear out the rest of the woman’s story. I could understand why Mother had made her assumption. It did not make sense that someone would wait four years before coming forth with such a claim as this. Without knowing any facts, I speculated that it might simply come down to money and that perhaps Mariette had been unaware of our declining financial situation. Admittedly, our house made us seem more affluent than we were. Our name alone, my mother’s name at least, had been known and respected in Manchester and London for years; she had avoided any scandal surrounding my father’s disastrous business dealings, and no doubt was keen to avoid any other.
So why would the Frenchwoman lie? To bring a child so far from home did not seem frivolous. Edgar’s regiment had confirmed that he had gone missing in battle. There seemed little hope. He had been somewhat prominent in London society prior to signing himself up for war, and many knew and respected him. He had been well connected, and sometimes his appearance in the paper at a social event seemed to suggest he was of considerable wealth. There had been a newspaper article about him some months after he went missing, a picture of a dashing captain on the front cover and the headline “What a Waste” above it. I imagined that such news might spread abroad, or if the French stranger was a frequent visitor to London, she might then have read the article herself.
After Mariette’s revelation, Peggy had bustled after us, accompanying Mother to her private wing.
“Get rid of her,” my mother hissed, climbing into bed, with Peggy promising to return with her medicines to help her sleep and a facecloth cooled with lavender water, the scent of which always clung to the air inside her room. Though the aches and her fatigue were the physical side of her maladies, I believe the illness that breaks the will to live was the worst of them. She had lost all interest in life and was far different from her youthful photographs on the walls of the library: bright, lively, placing her lips against my father’s cheek just before the photographer pressed the flash; and another astride a horse in tight riding pants, well before the suffrage movement helped abandon women’s etiquette of sidesaddle.
Lovely and slender, with light-brown hair and hazel eyes, she was well known for her intelligence and quick wit, all qualities that had been whittled away with age to reveal a shrunken version of herself. And there, amongst the images also, was my father: strong, commanding, dark hair, and crinkling eyes that sparkled under certain lights. He loved a laugh and a drink, spending more and more time away in London as the years went on. And my mother, somewhere between the last birth and my father’s new business venture, had stopped showing him any affection, had stopped inviting people to tea, and had stopped loving life.
After much fussing by Peggy, my mother lay with the small cloth across her forehead, her hair now blended with strands of aging white, her skin pasty, her mouth lined from years of discontent. I felt for her then. The life she had dreamed of gone too quickly and replaced with nothing but bad news. Her favorite son gone, her middle son foppish and only concerned about himself, and her younger son reserved and unlikely to achieve anything that might inspire her to see more light between her dark moments. I wanted to sit by her, hold her hand, and tell her that everything would be all right, doing what Edgar might have done, but her eyes were closed, and that meant all in the room were closed from her also.
Peggy followed me down the hall and whispered in my ear: “You had best see if the woman and the little one need a place to stay tonight. Bert said they walked here from whencesoever they came. It may well have been all the way from the station.” I thanked her for her concern. She gave me some instructions concerning a room and then returned to stay with Mother while I attended to our guests.
I found Mariette once more in the drawing room, perched on the edge of the chair, the child lying restlessly on the floor at her feet. I curiously examined the boy for some connection with Edgar, but found none, and, admittedly, shared much of Mother’s skepticism at that moment.
“She seems a little upset,” said Mariette. It was not said haughtily or spitefully but rather as if she had expected Mother’s reaction.
There were obviously questions I should have posed right then and there, but the timing seemed wrong somehow with the darkness closing in, Mother’s turn, and the child now restless. It was important at least out of charity, as Peggy suggested, that Mariette and the child be shown some courtesy. Even though Mother was against it, I could not ask the newcomer to leave, as she had likely spent days traveling. She may have had little rest, assuming she had come from across the Channel. I could not set her and the child off into the darkening Lakelands to find accommodation.
I asked Mariette whether she and her son would care to sleep in one of the guest rooms since it was growing late. She let out a sigh of relief and nodded, but shook her head when I off
ered to carry her bag. She followed me toward the floor above, examining the wood-paneled stairway walls that held photographs of minor members of monarchy and well-known faces from London society, all of whom had attended manor events at the end of the previous century. Visitors these days were friends of Laurence, the last ones early in the summer: “vexing” men, according to Peggy, who left cigar ash on the rugs and wore their muddied riding boots across them without care. Poor Peggy had spent several days busily cleaning up after them.
I ignited the light above a large oak bed, and the lake-view guest room was revealed in lamp-lit shades of softened gold. Mariette’s gaze fell across the books and prettily painted bowls on the shelf above the unlit fireplace opposite the bed, the green-and-peach floral wallpaper, the thick Moroccan rug, the ornate and elegant lamp bases, and the decorative, tapestried armchair in the corner. It was clear from the way she looked around in wonder, her eyes struggling to catch everything in the room, that she was overwhelmed by both the decadence and the size of the space. A writing desk overlooked the lake at the back, its hue now of blue deepened and shot with silver under the darkening sky. There was also a private bath area and a small separate room designed for visitors who once upon a time brought their personal maids.
The boy, introduced to me then as Samuel, was still solemn and keeping a close eye on me while he pulled uncomfortably at his fitted jacket sleeves. He had olive-green eyes, dark-brown hair, and a golden-brown complexion, much like Mariette’s, and wore a newly tailored shirt and short trousers that I imagined were purchased for the benefit of our meeting.
“It is very nice,” she said, her softly sensual voice suddenly infiltrating the small space beside me at the window.
“I think you should have everything you need here,” I said, finding it hard to meet her steady gaze.
She seemed very familiar, unaware there were certain proprieties about space between men and women who did not know one another. The women I had socialized with liked to glance away frequently when they talked and had an air of vulnerability and entitlement at the same time. But Mariette stood close, her eyes not leaving me. I found it difficult to know where to look, so I chose the view from the window again. She read me perhaps and my awkwardness and thus admired the view also.
“I knew this would be very beautiful,” she said, the last word elongated and syrupy in her accent. “But it is even grander than I imagined.”
“You speak English well,” I said.
It appeared that the French she had chosen to speak on her arrival had simply been a guard against my mother’s interrogation until I came. I wanted to ask her what exactly she was expecting as a result of her visit and what she knew about our family. I could not yet formulate an opinion of her, nor pose cleverly designed questions to ascertain a reasonable truth, until I had performed some preliminary investigation. I moved toward the door.
“Peggy will check on you shortly. Make sure you have everything you need. I expect I will see you later, and we can discuss things then.”
She looked back at me from the window, and I could see her expression change slightly, a sudden darkness at the mention of a conversation that none of us were looking forward to but one that would require some painful detail. The boy looked her way anxiously then, perhaps willing his mother to see me gone quickly.
“I know this is a lot to take in,” she said. “I know that you must be shocked. I am sorry about your mother.”
I nodded. “I’m not sure what to think just yet.”
I left her then with these guarded words, and without guarantees, to head toward the library on the top floor to search through the letters from my brother, to uncover anything that could link her to him, that could prove the boy was Edgar’s. Part of me wanted it to be true and part of me wanted them both gone so I did not have to deal with the matter that I suspected would lead to further complications.
Edgar’s letters were bound and kept in a desk drawer. I wondered how many times Mother had opened them. I read each letter, attempting to find something that would give Mariette away. Only one line gave me something. He had said that while on a day’s leave, he and a friend had gone into town and he found the girls there very pretty. But that was all he said. My brother had no serious girlfriends prior to his departure. If any visited the country estate as his guest in the summers, there was never a second visit. Edgar was methodical in everything he did, with any outcomes carefully engineered. The plan for Edgar had always been school, a degree, a partnership in a respectable accountancy firm, and, only then, after careful consideration, a wife.
I went to my room, tidied myself up, washed, and changed my shirt. I was intrigued if not keen to meet Mariette at dinnertime and wondered about Peggy busy in the kitchen, contemplating the dietary requirements of the child. I checked my reflection in the mirror. It was the same freckled face I had seen that morning: no great, wondrous change. Many said my father was handsome, and since I had inherited some of his physical characteristics, I supposed, though without his grand stature, there were some redeeming features about me.
I checked on Mother, who was in the dark now, lying motionless beneath the duvet, before returning back along the hallway to the dining room. Two places had been set, and I wondered where the child would take his meal. In the early days, as small children we ate in the kitchen, while our parents took their meals in the dining room. It wasn’t until we started school, and each showed some signs of adulthood, that we were allowed to join them at their table.
I waited for ten minutes with some anxiety about the meeting, but it quickly disappeared when Peggy came in with only one plate of food. Mariette, having journeyed long by sea, by train, and on foot, and with the child now asleep, had requested to take her meal in her room. But she told Peggy to tell me that she was very appreciative of my generosity as a host.
“She also asked me to give you this,” said Peggy. “She thought you might like it. She said it’s yours to keep.”
As soon as Peggy left the room, I eagerly opened the envelope, which contained a photograph of Edgar. He was not in uniform but in civilian shirt and trousers, standing amongst a group of people: three other men, and Mariette. In the background was a field of fruit trees, in careful lines, and a small low-set house. The paper was cracked and ragged, as if it, too, had experienced combat, and part of the image had been torn away at one end. Edgar looked relaxed, hands in pockets, smiling downward at something, away from the glare of the light, too bright perhaps, behind the photographer. The secretive smile hinted at restrained joy. I knew it well. On the back there was only the date: the year before we received word of him missing.
On the way to bed, I stopped by the kitchen to thank Peggy for organizing several meals, then returned to my room, which overlooked Bert’s square hedges and tinted gardens along the front entranceway toward oak trees and distant meadows that rose and dipped over sheep-grazing knolls. I spent most of the night wrestling with the sheets and pillow, with many thoughts running through my mind. Once I turned on a bedside lamp to look again at the photo; another time I tried hard to eliminate the image of Mariette’s tawny skin and black diamond eyes. Why would she give a photograph of Edgar away? Why would she not keep it to treasure? Unless she planned never to go, expecting always to be close to it. Or perhaps the image, the memory, meant little. As small as her gesture might seem, her parting with it bothered me, and neither of my own suppositions satisfied me. I eventually fell asleep, waking when the sun was balanced high above the distant fells.
I scolded myself for sleeping late and quickly changed. Halfway down the stairs, I followed the sounds of voices to find Peggy at the small table on the rear terrace with Mariette and the child. Stretching between the house and the lake was a green lawn, patched in places with many more of Bert’s favorite flowers embracing the surprisingly fine autumn weather, then wide stone stairs that stepped down toward the lake. A small boathouse near the water had been erected in my boyhood years, and my sailing boat was st
ored there.
Between the women were a pot of tea and several thin slices of toast spread with butter and marmalade. I could hear the discussion as I approached. Mariette was asking a question in well-versed English about the fish in the lake and the wildlife. The fact that she had pretended to understand only French before my arrival meant that she knew something of me already, that perhaps I had a more receptive temperament than my mother.
Mariette seemed to carefully measure my expression as I approached her.
“Good morning,” I said.
“Good morning,” they both replied.
“I see that you have begun with English today.”
“I must apologize for that,” she said, immediately aware of my meaning. “I was very nervous. Your mother . . . I probably seemed very rude.”
Not as rude as my mother can be, I wanted to say.
Mariette wore the same dress, her hair partly pinned, with thick curling strands over her shoulders. Her expression looked wearier than before, though it did not in any way lessen her beauty.
Peggy poured me some tea as I sat down, then asked if she could show Samuel the gardens. Mariette looked longingly at the boy before speaking to him in French. He nodded and keenly jumped off the chair to take Peggy’s outstretched hand. Mariette watched the pair leave us, then turned her attention on me.
In a Field of Blue Page 2
