by John Pearson
“You don’t seem terribly concerned,” said Richard. Elizabeth shrugged impatiently, as Richard remembered her doing as a schoolgirl when something bored her.
“I don’t see that it matters very much. I can’t imagine Lawrence marrying again, and I certainly don’t intend to.”
“What will you do then,” James inquired, “remain a sort of married spinster all your days?”
“Good heavens, no,” Elizabeth replied. “I’ll just have lovers.”
Richard smiled, but Marjorie and James were rather shocked.
“To my son and heir, Hugo Francis Villeroy Talbot-Cary, I additionally bequeath the goods, chattels, appurtenances, usufructs and rights as by time and custom heretofore established on the aforesaid property of Southwold House …”
Sir Geoffrey Dillon’s voice droned on like a priest’s at the litany.
Presumably he understood what these lawyers’ phrases meant, since he had put them into Lord Southwold’s will in the first place. But it was inconceivable that anybody else in that sunless room would understand them—least of all Hugo Francis Villeroy Talbot-Cary, twelfth Earl of Southwold, who was already nodding off to sleep in the big armchair in Dillon’s anteroom. His spouse, however, seemed very much awake. Bright-eyed and bird-like, she was following the lawyer’s every word and from time to time made notes in a small gold pad with a small gold propelling pencil.
It was an informal gathering for such an interesting event. Most of the family were there, two clerks from Dillon’s office, and that was that. The will was very long: with all its amendments and codicils it took the lawyer over half an hour to mumble through it, and it was not until towards the end that Richard began listening more attentively. The various legacies were listed: “To my daughter, Marjorie Elizabeth Helena Talbot-Cary, now Bellamy, the capital sum of ten thousand pounds. Also the interest on …” Here Dillon’s testamentary voice listed an unlikely batch of shares and bits of family property bequeathed to Marjorie in trust for her children. Both James and Elizabeth also received five thousand pounds immediately. Richard’s ears perked up; he expected to hear his own name any moment now. But after continuing the roll call of recipients of the dead Earl’s munificence—“to my butler, Henry Widgery, five hundred pounds and my silver coasters, to my game-keeper, Enoch Charnock, three hundred pounds and my black-thorn walking stick”—Sir Geoffrey’s voice ground to an abrupt and dusty halt.
Richard was indignant. Nobody else appeared to notice the omission of his name, but there was clearly some mistake. There had been the codicil Lord Southwold added to his will eight years earlier, leaving the lease of 165 to him. Why had it not been mentioned?
“Embarrassing,” said Dillon in a voice that made it plain that the embarrassment lay with Richard, not with him.
“But I see nothing in the least embarrassing,” said Richard, struggling, as he often did with Dillon, to keep his temper. “Lord Southwold told me he was leaving the lease of 165 to me. You were present and you made the codicil. So I repeat my question. Why was the codicil omitted from the will?”
Sir Geoffrey sucked his teeth before replying, a habit that infuriated Richard further still.
“We must distinguish here between the intention and the effect. Lord Southwold certainly did tell you he intended leaving you the house. I confirm that unreservedly. But I persuaded him that it was only prudent to make this a discretionary bequest.”
“A what?” said Richard.
“A discretionary bequest; that is to say that the bequest depends upon the approval of the executor.”
“But, Geoffrey, you are the executor.”
Dillon nodded, smiling his faint Samurai smile. “And unfortunately I find myself unable to approve the bequest. Not on any personal grounds, of course, but simply because it isn’t possible.”
“And why not, Geoffrey?” Richard asked grimly.
“Simply because there’s not the money. My first loyalty, my only loyalty, is to the Southwold family and to the earls of Southwold. The estate, as you must know, is heavily in debt. On top of that there are the huge death duties to be met.”
“And on top of that,” said Richard, “there are Hugo’s long-standing debts to be paid. That’s what you’re saying, isn’t it?”
Once again Sir Geoffrey Dillon nodded and smiled. “The rights and wrongs of this are immaterial,” he said. “All that concerns me is to find sufficient money to insure that the present earl shall live as his ancestors did before him. Assets must be sold and sacrifices made. I am afraid that these include the valuable lease to 165 Eaton Place.”
“But this is gross dishonesty. You know as well as I do that Lord Southwold left that house to me!”
“Dishonesty? That’s a strong word to use against a lawyer, Richard. I suggest that you repeat it in a court of law.”
But how could he? Dillon knew as well as anyone that he could not. Richard possessed no money for a long legal battle, and even if he had, how could he ever fight a case like that? The gutter press would love it—and the lawyers. Just think of the dirt that would come up in court, the skeletons from all those cupboards! Think of the questions learned counsel would undoubtedly put: “And is it true, Mr. Bellamy, that throughout the twenty-five years of your marriage you have been totally supported from the bounty of the Southwolds? Don’t you consider that enough, Mr. Bellamy?” No, it was obviously impossible.
But the fact was that without the house the Bellamys were facing something close to disaster. Marjorie still had her income; that was mercifully tied up in equities and nobody could touch them. But there was Richard’s overdraft to be repaid and there was not the faintest possibility of discovering sufficient money to buy 165 from the estate. He had been tricked and cheated—and to make it worse there was not a thing that he could do about it. He also had to break the news to Marjorie.
Remorse, that horrible affliction of the middle-aged, was once again pursuing Richard Bellamy. Had he been tougher, firmer, more farsighted, he would never have let himself be caught in this degrading situation. He could see his mistakes all too clearly now. Throughout his married life he had allowed the Southwold influence to overshadow him. He had been weak and idle and complacent. Instead of standing on his own two feet he had allowed the Southwolds to support him, and now that the show-down had arrived he was seeing the results—failure as a politician, failure as a father, and now failure as a husband too. For what sort of husband was he to allow a thing like this to happen—and then to be too frightened to break the news to Marjorie?
What a wrench they’d find it, leaving Eaton Place! Once more he realised how much he loved the house. It had become as much a part of him as the shell is to a snail. He and Marjorie could change, of course—they’d have to—but how much he’d miss the comfort and dignity of the place. A quarter of a century they’d lived there now, and the house held his memories, his books, his few possessions. It was the background to all the happiness he could remember. It was the centre of his universe.
Ah well. He climbed the stairs in search of Marjorie. If he had to face reality, the sooner now the better, but she was nowhere to be seen. He rang the bell in the drawing room and Hudson answered. No, Lady Marjorie was taking tea with Lady Prudence Fairfax, but Miss Elizabeth was in her room. Did he wish to see her? Richard nodded.
Once again Richard was impressed by the way his daughter’s looks had recently improved. Mercifully she had finally recovered from the birth of Lucy, and he was delighted at her calmness over the trouble with the absurd divorce. But the best thing of all about her was her honesty. Maddening she might be—what young lady wasn’t?—but he could always talk to her and always know that she would listen (much more than Marjorie, who was more a talker than a listener). They were also so alike that she understood his moods and often seemed to know what he was thinking of before he spoke. She did so now.
“What is it, Father? Money?”
Elizabeth was the last person he had intended talking to about his troubles
, but almost automatically he found himself nodding, and before long he was telling her the whole depressing story. She was outraged, especially at Dillon, whom she hated. But she was also very practical.
“Father,” she said, “will you let me help you?”
“Of course, my dear, but how?”
“I don’t know if I can, but I have a friend who’s very rich and always saying that he wants to help me. I think I’ll try him.”
“What friend?” Richard asked suspiciously.
“A man called Karekin. He’s a financier and he’s very fond of me.”
“You mean that terrible Armenian? Elizabeth, I positively forbid you to do anything of the sort!”
“Don’t be silly, Father. He amuses me, and don’t forget that according to the law I’m a most unrespectable married woman. It might work and it will do no harm. But in the meantime take my advice Say nothing at all to mother.”
Elizabeth’s relationship with Karekin was far from innocent, but they were not in love, and Elizabeth had told the truth when she said that he amused her. Indeed, they amused each other in a sophisticated sort of way. After her previous disasters with men, Elizabeth had decided she would never fall in love again. This intrigued Karekin, who had never met a pretty and intelligent young English girl of such good family who was willing, even eager, to sleep with him but who wanted absolutely nothing else—no love, nor fidelity, nor even marriage. This was why he always tried to tempt her with offers of extravagent presents, which she always refused. And this was why he cheerfully agreed when she finally did ask him one big favour—to buy 165 and present it to her parents. For Karekin, unlike wealthy Anglo-Saxons, treated wealth as the unreal substance it is. If it enabled him to make his strange young mistress happy, that was simply as it should be.
Richard, of course, felt very different. At first he totally refused to accept what he nearly called Elizabeth’s “wages of sin.” That he didn’t call them that was due to a certain vein of—call it common sense or call it opportunism. Either way, it finally permitted him to calm his conscience and somewhat grudgingly accept the offer—although he never liked to dwell on the way 165 had finally been saved for him and for the family, and his sense of delicacy made him insist that Marjorie should not be told a word of what had happened. Rather than that, he asked that the lease simply be continued as it had been before Lord Southwold died—in Marjorie’s name. That way the whole distressing business could be quietly forgotten.
1912
14. Death by Drowning
“My God, how terrible! How simply terrible!” Richard exclaimed. “And poor dear Cressida. What an appalling thing!”
Marjorie peered up at Richard from the toast and marmalade. She was looking rather drawn these days.
“Cressida who?” she asked a little sharply. “And what’s so terrible?”
Richard slowly lowered the barrier of that morning’s Times and, peering with some solemnity over the lenses of his spectacles, spoke in his bringer-of-bad-tidings voice.
“Boy Hartington’s been killed.”
“How ghastly, Richard. How?”
“In one of those infernal airplanes at Farnborough. Only this time last week I was talking to him in the House. He was so full of energy and life and now this happens! You really must inquire if there is anything we can do for Cressida.”
“Of course,” said Marjorie. “I’ll write to her at once. Perhaps she’d like to come and stay.”
For Richard there was something ominous about Boy Hartington’s death. Tall, serious, good-looking, he had always seemed to tread a golden pathway through the world of politics and high society. Richard had rather envied the charmed life he seemed to lead. Heir to the wealthy Viscount Lindfield, he had been something of a poet and a connoisseur of art; he was also a traveller, a wit, a discreet womaniser and an accomplished sportsman. Even his nickname hinted at the atmosphere of effortless perpetual youth surrounding him. If anybody summed up the easy, pleasure-loving world that still existed in that second bright decade of the changing century, it was the Honourable Richard Hartington. And now, with no rhyme or reason, he had been destroyed by one of these so-called machines of the future. If this was what the future would be like, what hope was there for anyone?
“What d’you think Cressida will do?” he asked Marjorie.
“I’m sure she will take it very well. She’s young and pretty and she’s fairly scatterbrained. I can’t imagine that she’ll pine for long. Besides, there are no children. She’ll find somebody.”
Richard nodded—and thought to himself how heartless women were in the face of tragedy.
In point of fact, with Marjorie the exact opposite was true. Just lately there had been too much tragedy and suffering in her life: if she appeared callous in her reaction to poor Hartington it was the sort of self-defence that outwardly impassive and controlled aristocrats like Marjorie frequently employ to hide their feelings. Nothing had gone right for her since her father died.
First there had been the news of Charles Hammond’s death. That had required all her self-control to keep from breaking down. The affair, of course, had ended several years before, but they had kept in touch and he had remained a sort of secret, unattainable dream. Nothing had thrilled her more than when she heard that he had won his V.C. fighting on the Khyber Pass, and when the news came through that Major Hammond, V.C., had been killed in an ambush on the North-West Frontier, something had died within her. She told nobody, not even Prudence, but she accepted that this spelled the end of love and passion in her life. She “loved” Richard still, of course. She was fond of him and used to him and she depended on him. All these things she admitted for she was always honest where emotions were concerned. But this was not the sort of love that she had felt for Charles, and without that she often wondered if her life was really worth living.
One of the consolations that had kept her going had been her family, and in particular her granddaughter, little Lucy Kirbridge. But once again nothing had gone quite right within the family. James, since he left the army, had become impossible. He was moody and unsettled, and there had been little real affection between them for some time. It seemed that he blamed everyone for the fact that he was having to “slave” in a City office for a living when with a little luck he might have owned his beloved Southwold. What James needed, she and Richard both agreed, was a good woman he could marry, but he seemed caught in an insoluble marital dilemma: those who were suitable weren’t pretty, and those who were pretty just weren’t suitable. From the way things were going James seemed all set to be a bachelor for life.
Why had both the children got in such dreadful muddles over sex? She often asked herself that but it was not a question she could answer. Nor could she discuss it with Richard, who got far too worked up over it all. But she suspected in her heart of hearts that it had something obscurely to do with the way she had married outside her class. Her mother had always told her this would happen. She had pooh-poohed the idea at the time, but perhaps this really had caused the children those frustrations and uncertainties that had made their lives so difficult. When she was depressed she told herself that her life had been a terrible mistake from the moment she married.
The truth was that her passionate and dominating nature needed something to keep it occupied, and that now she had less and less to do, especially since Elizabeth and Lucy had left for America. Marjorie could sympathise with her daughter and with the reasons that had made her go, but she missed her dreadfully. During the months that followed the breakup of the marriage Elizabeth had confided in her a lot, and for the first time in years Marjorie had felt close to her. Unlike Richard, she could understand Elizabeth’s affair with Karekin. As Elizabeth put it, she had had enough of “love” with Kirbridge. He had loved her—but that was all he ever did. One could have too much of undiluted love. It had left her longing for a man who simply wanted her without the muddle and responsibility of love, and in Karekin she had found him. But when the affair e
nded—as it was bound to—she had felt increasingly oppressed in England. There were too many memories, and although she attempted to brazen out the fiasco of the divorce, she was miserable about the wretched business. As she told her mother, she felt neither one thing nor the other. Since the King’s Proctor blocked her divorce, she was a married woman who hadn’t got a marriage, and at twenty-four she was not prepared to spend the remainder of her life “either in chastity or in immorality.”
It was to avoid this that she finally decided she would have to go off to America for a divorce at Reno. In Reno there was no King’s Proctor to insist on keeping young women miserably married to husbands who would not make love to them. But afterwards what Marjorie feared had happened. Elizabeth had fallen for the very New York lawyer who had won her the divorce and had promptly married him. This meant that henceforth she must live in exile, for if she entered England she would be a bigamist.
This was no hardship for Elizabeth. She had Lucy with her, and a husband who adored her, and an apartment overlooking Central Park. But Marjorie was at an age when she needed grandchildren around her, and she became dependent on her weekly letter from New York.
Marjorie had had other setbacks too, most of them associated with the decline of the Southwolds. For a few months after her father died it had looked as if the new Lord Southwold, helped by the unscrupulous loyalty of Geoffrey Dillon, would somehow manage to survive in all the ancestral splendours of his inheritance. Marion had started to refurbish Southwold House. Martin and Georgina had been brought over and put into boarding schools. The Grosvenor Square establishment was sold; so were Lord Southwold’s horses and his estates in Scotland. Most of the library and the Southwold Rubens went to America.
If it had been only a question of meeting Hugo’s debts, all would have been well. Dillon, however much one loathed the man, was a most skilled financial juggler. But not even his sleight of hand could cope with the double disaster of the death duties followed by old Lady Southwold’s death.
