by Lily Hammond
There was a scullery off the kitchen, and Libby poked her head around the door, saw what it was, and retreated without interest. Another door led to a butler’s pantry, and Libby looked at the rows of silverware with her eyebrows raised in appreciation. She’d known Clemency was well off, and that she was society’s preferred photographer, despite being a woman, but it only came home to her now, that Clemency herself was a society woman. Or could be, Libby supposed, if she’d wanted the position. And perhaps if she’d not been a lesbian.
The last room off the kitchen was obviously a small sitting room, used by Riley and Dot when they wanted to put their feet up. Libby wrinkled her nose at it. It was a very comfortable room, with two armchairs, even a wireless. Clemency obviously thought a lot of her help.
Well, Libby reminded herself, that just made Clemency a nice person, and didn’t she want to be with a nice person? The kettle whistled on the stove, and she went over to it, picking it up, twisting the gas off, and pouring the steaming water into a small teapot she’d got ready on a tray with cup and saucer. She carried it up to her room. Let Dot get tea for the other girl, if she pleased. Libby hadn’t decided how to handle this Eliza business yet.
There were more voices outside her bedroom door, and Libby got back up and walked over to it. This time she opened it and stepped out into the hallway.
‘What are you doing?’ she asked, although she needn’t have. It was perfectly obvious. Riley was holding a bedroom door open, and Dot, supporting the girl – who was dressed now in a very fine quilted dressing gown, made, Libby thought, of silk, with her hair dry and falling in a long, luxurious red curtain down her back – was leading her through the door. Right into the bedroom next to Libby’s own. Opposite what Libby had already deduced was Clemency’s chamber.
‘She’s not well. We’re putting her to bed.’ It was Dot who answered, and insolently, Libby thought.
‘Down here?’ Libby asked before she could stop herself. She was both appalled and hurt, and she snapped her mouth shut because it had shown in her voice.
‘Down here,’ came the reply, and this time it was the housekeeper herself who answered. ‘Clemency would not want it otherwise.’
Libby, her face burning with sudden humiliation, withdrew back into her room and closed the door. She stood in the middle of the room, confused, her body first hot, then cold. Unknowingly, she spread her hands to the room as though asking a question of it.
‘What do I do now?’ she murmured, dropping her hands and looking across at the letter that still only had Clemency’s name written upon it. Her face burned, and Libby pressed her palms to the hot cheeks. She walked over to the bed on stiff legs and sank down on the mattress to look at the door in dismay.
So, Libby thought, trying to stop her mind from swirling around in useless circles. She swallowed, her mouth dry as though she’d eaten a mouthful of sand. That’s what humiliation tastes like, she thought, like sand, gritty and dry. She licked her lips.
What was she to do now? Part of her – a very big part of her, perhaps even most of her – wanted to leap up and snatch her suitcase from the wardrobe and throw her belongings back into it, then leave the house, maybe even the city, and never look back. Libby tried to think if it would be possible for her to get her old job back. Maybe, she thought. Old Leonard Coggins had liked her, she thought. He might take her back. She was good at developing film. He said she had a real knack for it.
It wasn’t running her own studio though, and a prestigious studio. And she’d have to find new rooms. She’d given notice and the two small rooms she’d made comfortable and cosy enough would now be the domain of some other young woman by now. Mariette Sullivan wouldn’t have lost a moment in renting them out again. Her house had a good reputation in a good area. They would have been rented the day they were advertised.
All of which left Libby where, exactly? She sat on the bed and listened to the murmurs from the room next door. Wasn’t this Eliza person supposed to be elsewhere? She’d heard Clemency and Maxine and Ruth talk briefly about her before she’d taken them to the station, but she’d never in her wildest dreams put two and two together and come up with the fact that the woman they were talking about was Clemency’s lover. Clemency herself certainly hadn’t given any indication.
And perhaps there was the crux of the matter. Perhaps Clemency wasn’t too attached. Libby nodded to herself and flattened her palms on her thighs. Perhaps – surely – it had just been a bit of a fling. Eliza, when she wasn’t half-drowned and feverish, probably had a pretty enough face. And Clemency was human after all.
Libby stood up and moved towards the window, looking out the glass. Her bedroom was on the back of the house, and there was no view down to the harbour. Instead, she looked out over the kitchen garden, and the orchard, and a short spread of lawn that ended abruptly up against a wild swag of bush. She sighed, and her breath fogged the glass. She touched a fingertip to the condensation, drawing an L. L for Libby. She almost drew a C as well but wiped the fog away with a fist instead.
Clemency would come back and sort all this out, Libby decided. She would send Eliza packing, off to wherever it was that the girl was supposed to go. Gently packing, but away all the same. After all – what future was there for Clemency, with all her refinement and education and money, with a ragamuffin girl who was fresh off the streets?
None, that’s what Libby told herself. There was no future, and Clemency wasn’t a stupid woman. She had to know that. – Why, Libby thought. Clemency did know that, hence Libby being here. Even Libby getting the job of managing the studio said that. She didn’t know what the other two applicants had been like, but she thought that on this occasion, and in this circumstance, finally, being a woman and a lesbian had gone directly in her favour.
Closing her eyes, Libby took another deep breath and leaned her forehead against the cold glass. Here’s what she would do, she decided. She would stay. She would even be pleasant to the damned girl in the next room. She would carry on as though the complication that was Eliza did not exist – because really, how could it? Clemency would be back in a week, and she would remove Eliza back to Ruth and Maxine’s house, where the girl could resume her relocation to whatever job someone had organised for her, and then Clemency would look at Libby, and Libby would be ready.
Because, really, they were perfect for each other.
She straightened and went to the door again, full of resolve. There was something else she could do, she’d realised. The hallway was empty, and she ignored the voices still murmuring from the next room. There was something she could do, and all it would take was a telephone call.
Chapter Forty-Five
Clemency, happily unaware of the furore happening back in her household in Port Chalmers, got off the train in Christchurch and knuckled the grit from her eyes. She remembered now why she was content most of the time to stay in the old hometown.
‘That was a nightmare,’ Maxine grumbled.
‘Even in first class,’ Clemency agreed, yawning and looking around for her case.
‘I’m very glad you let us upgrade our tickets,’ Maxine said. ‘Remind me to always let you do that.’
Clemency grinned. ‘You always do,’ she said and nudged her friend. ‘There are our things; let’s get them, shall we? And get to the hotel. I could go a good glass of brandy and then a nice hot meal at a table that doesn’t rattle from side to side.’
Both of them had packed lightly, and both of them plucked up their cases from the platform beside the steaming train and left the station in search of a taxicab.
‘Christchurch hasn’t changed much,’ Clemency said, looking out the window as they went to the hotel where they had rooms booked and waiting.
‘No,’ Maxine agreed. ‘Still flat.’
‘Can’t see the sea,’ Clemency added. The driver glanced over his shoulder at them, but kept his mouth shut. Mind you, Clemency reminded herself, New Brighton beach was a lovely stretch of sand. Especially if you liked
piers and crowds with your sea and your sun.
They arrived at the hotel with sighs of relief and Clemency checked them in, speaking very pointedly at the clerk when he kept glancing over her shoulder at Maxine, who stood waiting with their cases. The clerk’s face had a pinched look Clemency was all too familiar with when she travelled with Maxine. She wanted to lean over the smooth expanse of oak counter between them and grab the man by his tie and shake his snobbery and prejudice right out of him. But if she did that to him, she’d have to do the same with almost everyone else in the place.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, returning to Maxine and waiting for the bell hop to pick up their cases and lead the way.
‘I’m used to it,’ Maxine replied, not even bothering to pretend she didn’t know what Clemency was talking about.
‘We should have stayed with friends, instead.’
‘I’m not feeling particularly sociable,’ Maxine sighed. ‘So we’ll make the most of it. As long as you stick by me, they won’t think they ought to try questioning my right to be here because I’m brown.’ She turned to face the front of the lift as the doors closed. ‘And I can take the looks,’ she added, rolling her eyes. ‘One gets used to them.’
It was a relief to reconvene in the lounge, freshly bathed and changed. ‘What shall we have?’ Maxine asked. ‘The usual? It’s late enough.’
Clemency nodded in agreement and raised her hand to a passing waiter, who came over and gave her an attentive expression.
‘Two glasses of scotch,’ she told him.
‘With water, madam?’
She looked over at Maxine, who shrugged. ‘Please,’ Clemency said, then shrugged right back at Maxine when the man had left for their drinks. ‘No point getting carried away on an empty stomach.’
But Maxine was looking at the entrance to the lounge. ‘I think we’re about to have visitors,’ she said, feeling her heart sink. She was tired and out of sorts. Her back ached from the constant motion of the train. She wanted to be at home walking into the kitchen where Ruth was peeling potatoes, her hair bobbed short enough to reveal the tender nape of her neck where Maxine always liked to kiss. She sighed.
Clemency twisted in her seat and peered towards the door in dismay. ‘Maybe they’re not here for us,’ she said, hope igniting then dying in her chest, when the pair of women spotted them and waved.
‘They’re here for us, all right,’ Maxine said. ‘They question is – how did they know we’d be here?’ She turned narrowed eyes on Clemency who held her hands up.
‘Don’t look at me,’ she said. ‘It never even crossed my mind to let Regina and Hetty know we would be in town.’ She tried to arrange a smile onto her face as she watched the pair come over. ‘I’ll bet it was Libby – who else would it be?’ She stood up and leaned forward to greet the two women.
‘Hetty,’ she said. ‘You’re looking well. Regina – this is a surprise.’
‘Hello darling,’ Regina replied. ‘You didn’t think you could sneak through town without our knowing, did you?’ She turned and smiled at Maxine. ‘Hello Max, old chum. You look rotten tired. Bad trip on the train?’
‘Long,’ Maxine said. ‘How did you know we’d be here?’ She hadn’t bothered to rise. She was too tired to be polite.
There was a titter of laughter from Hetty. ‘Were you trying to go incognito?’
That just made Maxine shrug, and she watched Clemency gesture for the pair to sit down. Always polite, was Clemency. Her father had drilled the social graces into her from the time she was old enough to totter about. Maxine’s own father, on the other hand, must have decided to rebel against his uptight Scottish heritage at some stage, because he hadn’t been at all bothered with social graces and Maxine knew she’d inherited the trait.
‘Not incognito,’ she replied. ‘Simply passing through. You know how exhausting that trip can be. The train stops at every tiny station along the way and barely goes any faster than walking speed between.’
‘You sound like you’re getting old, Maxine,’ Regina said, holding up a finger to the approaching waiter.
‘None of us are getting any younger,’ Maxine said, receiving her drink with an unbecoming amount of gratitude. If she’d needed this before, she needed it doubly now, she thought. Not that she didn’t like Regina and Hetty. Just tonight, she would have preferred a drink, dinner, and her bed. She was nervous about the next day. And the next few after that.
Clemency watched her friend, picking up her mood and determining to get rid of Hetty and Regina just as quickly as she could.
‘That is certainly the truth,’ Regina said, and Clemency felt Regina’s gaze upon her before moving back to Maxine. ‘How is dear Ruth? You both must come and stay with us sometime soon. It’s been too long.’
There was a tap on Clemency’s leg, and Hetty leaned over to speak in her slightly breathless, confidential tone. ‘How’s Libby?’ she asked. The low lighting from the hotel lounge Tiffany lamps made her expression uncomfortably intimate.
Of course it had been Libby. Clemency wasn’t sure what she thought about that, but there wasn’t the time to decide.
‘She’s well, as far as I know,’ Clemency replied and was treated to another of Hetty’s most confiding smiles.
‘She’s very well, I happen to know,’ Hetty said, still leaning over her chair towards Clemency. ‘She wrote to me, told me you’d given her the job of running your studio in town.’ Her carefully lipsticked mouth smiled wider, showing sharp little teeth that always reminded Clemency of the little poodle she’d had when she was a child. ‘How perfectly marvellous for the both of you!’
Clemency picked up her drink, wondering why Libby had needed to tell these two she was in town. She must have telephoned them – the post was fast, but not that fast. A letter between Dunedin and Christchurch would take at least a day.
She smiled. ‘She came well qualified for the job,’ she said.
Hetty nodded, and her smile stayed firmly on her lips. ‘And of course, Libby is also very suitable in other ways, is she not?’ Hetty sat back slightly, her smile turning complacent. ‘And we all know you’re thinking – finally – about settling down.’ She tittered again. ‘We’ve all been waiting a long time for that to happen – why, Regina and I almost put wagers on whether it ever would at all.’
Clemency glanced past Hetty at Maxine, narrowing her eyes at her friend, knowing that Maxine was regularly in touch with these two, and would have mentioned – quite in passing, she was sure – that good old Clemency was getting a bit lonely in her dotage. But Maxine had been corralled into conversation with Regina and didn’t see Clemency’s quick glare.
‘Libby is currently staying in your house, is she not?’ Hetty asked, and then waited, her small, quick, birdlike eyes on Clemency while the waiter put her drink and Regina’s down on the little table between them. When he was gone, she continued, picking up the small glass of something pink. ‘Very generous of you to offer her a room while she looks for accommodation of her own.’ She smiled again, and Clemency found herself looking at the dimples on Hetty’s soft cheeks and wishing she and Maxine had gone straight through into the dining room.
‘It was the least I could do,’ she said pleasantly.
Hetty nodded and sipped her drink before putting it back down on the table. ‘Of course, of course,’ she said. ‘And such a good opportunity to get to know her better – considering what a lovely couple you might make, upon getting to know each other better.’
Hetty, always the matchmaker, wasn’t getting any more subtle about it, Clemency thought. ‘Except I am not at home with her,’ she pointed out.
‘Yes,’ Hetty said and laughed again. ‘It seems a lost opportunity indeed. But I’m sure your work will throw you two together plenty. We do expect very good news about you both, very soon.’
The insinuation – if something so blatant could even be called that – irritated Clemency for some reason. And try as she might, she couldn’t reason out what Hetty’s real po
int was. She was sure, however, that there was one. Lurking behind the woman’s eyes, which glittered in the subdued lighting, was a calculation Clemency couldn’t quite fathom.
‘Libby is a very attractive woman, and a fine photographer,’ Clemency said slowly. ‘But I don’t know that I find myself interested in her in a more personal manner.’
For a moment, Hetty’s face was shuttered, her feelings hidden behind a wall, and then she blinked, pressing her lips together. ‘But that’s a hastily made judgement, don’t you think?’
‘I don’t know,’ Clemency said, picking up her own glass and gazing around the lounge where small groups and couples chatted quietly in the understated but well-appointed surroundings. Fatigue tugged at her, and she stifled a yawn. She knew what Hetty wanted, and she wasn’t much interested. Eliza’s image rose in her mind and she drew a sharp breath in, her skin prickling under the clothes she wore, nipples tightening in a sudden, unbidden arousal. She gulped at her drink, took a steadying breath, and looked back at Hetty.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘What did you say?’
‘I said, it seems in very poor taste to have your floozie staying at your house in the room next to Libby – especially after the intimacy you have shared with dear Libby.’
Clemency blinked, sitting minutely straighter. ‘I beg your pardon?’ she said, not understanding any of what Hetty had just said.
‘The kiss you shared,’ Hetty said, her gaze having lost its softness and now very pointed. ‘The dinner, the kiss – all that is something of a promise, wouldn’t you say?’
Clemency stared at her in disbelief, then flicked her gaze towards Regina, who was no longer keeping Maxine engaged, but was looking her way. Maxine looked at her too, a question in her eyes. Clemency just blinked at her, then turned back to Hetty.
