by Alis Hawkins
What the Girls Found was the thickest of the three books. The other two – Tales from the Western Shore, or a Young Man’s Awakening and Two Rollicking Lads, Scenes of London Life looked as if they’d be easier to get through. At least as far as the number of pages was concerned.
I’d had enough of London for now, so I opened Tales from the Western Shore and – though I started it with one eye closed, so to speak – within a minute, I was as absorbed as if I’d been reading a penny blood. It might be ‘erotic’ but it was also the story of a young man and I found myself pulled in by it.
Every now and then I’d look up and be surprised to see fields and countryside outside the train. The small port in Tales from the Western Shore – which was never given a name but was Aberaeron to a ‘t’ – was described in such lifelike detail that I was there.
The ship’s chandlery featured, too, as a trysting place. Amorous adventures took place by moonlight among the barrels of slippery fish oil and boxes of stiff white candles. But the ‘awakenings’ weren’t confined to the shop. They took place in gently tossing boats; on warm, yielding sand; in the unexplored crevices of dark and dripping caves – there seemed to be nowhere within a day’s walk of Aberaeron where the Young Man hadn’t had some adventure or another. With girls and boys.
An hour later, I’d finished the book and a lot of things had become clear. The young man of the western shore was obviously Nicholas Rowland, and now I knew why he’d been estranged from his father. The old man’d deliberately dropped a loaded crate on Nicholas’s hands after seeing them wrapped around another boy’s cock. Rowland junior had left and never once looked back.
Of course, after reading Tales from theWestern Shore, I knew what to expect when I opened the Rollicking Lads. The plot, such as it was, was a bit different and all the ‘scenes’ happened in London – sometimes spied on by the Lads and sometimes involving them – but, just like the characters in the Western Shore, everybody seemed to be having a high old time.
By the time we reached Bristol, I’d finished the adventures of the rollicking lads and started on What the Girls Found, where I read how the Naughty Pupils – Nan and Ruth, renamed Bess and Mary – had gone up to their teacher’s loft one summer’s day while they were waiting for him to come and tutor them.
Curious as to the literature with which their beloved mentor beguiles his leisure hours, our heroines lightly peruse the small store of books to be found in his poor bookcase.
I remembered that bookcase. Built out of books and a plank. And, of course, the titles hadn’t meant anything to me at the time. But Gus Gelyot’d pointed one of them out to me in Wych Street. Fanny Hill. Of course, that was all that’d been written on the spine and, when I saw the book in Rowland’s loft, I’d passed over it. Thought it was just another one of the Jane Eyre and Mary Barton brigade. It was only when I’d seen its title page spread wide in the Wych Street window that I’d realised it was The Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure.
If that subtitle’d appeared on the spine as well as inside, our investigation into Nicholas Rowland’s death would’ve been very different. We’d have asked a lot more questions about Mr Wonderful Rowland. And perhaps we’d have been a bit quicker to listen to Llew Price, too.
But the naughty girls had been more curious than me.
‘Fanny Hill,’ cried Bess,‘I once had a friend called Fanny!’ And she slipped the book from amongst its fellows and opened it at the first narrative page.’
Before I got off the train, I’d read enough of What the Girls Found to start to worry that the suspicions the Mabinogi had raised might not’ve been so fanciful after all. What exactly had happened to Nan Walters and Ruth Eynon in that loft? Where did real life end, in this book, and fantasy begin? Because, if Rowland and the girls had got up to all the things described, then Ruth Eynon very definitely had a claim on a marriage contract from him. Come to that, so did Nan Walters. Mind, whether either of them would’ve wanted him, given what the girls in the book’d spied their teacher doing with another man, was another matter. And the same could be said of their marriageability; I’d never be able to hear the term ‘intimate friends’ again without blushing.
In my mind, there couldn’t be much doubt that the girls’d been responsible for writing the books with Nicholas Rowland. Who else could’ve done it? There was weeks and months of work here in these books and there’d been nobody else who could’ve helped him – his friend Caldicot had only recently come back from London. So, even if Nan and Ruth’d just written what he dictated and had no part in the actual invention, they weren’t the good little girls they pretended to be, were they?
That night, back in the same Bristol garret, I lit the same lamp at the same ridiculous extra price and sat down on the bed with the parcel containing Nicky Revell’s latest work.
I cut the string with my penknife and unfolded the paper to find three books and an envelope containing banknotes. The books were identical. All three were bound in green leather embossed in gold, just like Miss Guest’s Mabinogi; much more handsome than the other erotic books which’d been pretty cheaply produced.
The gold lettering on the front read Amorous Celtic Tales of Long Ago. And, when I flipped the book open and looked at the title page, there was the sub-title: The Ancient Tales of the Mabinogi Re-told for Cosmopolitan Gentlemen. It reminded me of the book in Gordon’s window – The Amorous Adventures of a Thousand Arabian Nightsby A Sloe-Eyed Seductress. I’d never read the original Arabian Nights stories but I was pretty sure they weren’t considered to be erotic literature. Presumably, using old tales and adding elements that would appeal to ‘cosmopolitan gentlemen’ was easier than making up your own.
I stared at the Amorous Celtic Tales. I didn’t want to read it. Because, now I knew what erotic literature was, I could imagine how the tales of the Mabinogi would be re-told.
The people in Nicky Revell’s other books had all been willing – no, eager – participants in the goings-on. But that wasn’t the case in the Mabinogi, was it? There were forced marriages, rape, incest. I didn’t want to read about those. Especially not in the kind of anatomical detail that Nicky Revell was fond of.
But, however much I disliked the prospect, I couldn’t go home and admit to Harry that I hadn’t even opened it. I wanted to be able to look him in the eye – even if he couldn’t see me doing it – and tell him exactly what use Rowland’d made of the tales Miss Gwatkyn set so much store by. Exactly how much of a motive these books represented for anybody who cared about the girls.
I wasn’t going to have Harry think that I was too weak, too – what was the word Mr Schofield’d been so fond of? – pusillanimous to do what needed to be done by a coroner’s officer.
Putting the moment off, I looked around the dismal little room. The window in the eaves caught the lamplight and I saw my own dim reflection. My specs magnified my eyes and made them look huge. Like a calf’s. Or a girl’s.
Nan Walters and Ruth Eynon had written the words in this book. If they could do that, I could read it.
Harry
‘Leo was my art master,’ Miss Gwatkyn said. ‘My father had undertaken most of my education himself but he was sufficiently concerned about my place in society to understand that I needed the accomplishments of a lady. So he employed a music master who tutored me at the piano and, once I had mastered that, an art master.’ She sighed. ‘We got on famously.’
Having been educated at home and denied much experience of the world, it was, perhaps, not surprising that the youthful Phoebe Gwatkyn had fallen in love with the first eligible man to pay her any attention.
‘My father was away a great deal and, though he might have realised that I needed to learn the arts of refinement, he failed to remember that I might also need chaperoning and Leo and I were left alone a good deal. He always behaved like a perfect gentleman but I was not to be refused. I told him that I wanted to marry him, however much he was ‘not the marrying kind’. I didn’t know what he meant, of course, and, a
t first, he was too careful of my tender sensibilities to tell me. I thought that, if I showered enough love upon him, he would see that he was the marrying kind. At least where I was concerned.
‘Eventually, he was forced to tell me the truth in the hope that I would desist. But even that could not make me stop loving him. I told him that I just wanted to be with him and that, if he married me, he could leave off being a tutor and paint as he wanted to. That we could move to London.’
‘So his illness – Italy – is a necessary fiction?’ I asked.
‘No! Not at all. He is ill – or at least, he was when we lived in London. Not at first. At the beginning, we managed to be happy together. He did love me, in his way, and did his best to fulfil his end of the bargain. We had a child – a son – Justin. I called him Iestyn. Leo adored him. Couldn’t believe that he’d had a part in creating such a beautiful child. We were happy,’ she repeated.
‘But he betrayed you?’ I said.
Miss Gwatkyn sighed. ‘Leo couldn’t betray me. I knew from the beginning what he was, what he would do. It was understood between us. Accepted. He would love me as best he could but—’
I saw her hands clasp in her lap, as if she were looking for comfort and had nobody but herself to provide it.
‘No, the thing that destroyed our marriage was the death of our son.’
At four years old, little Justin had fallen ill. A sudden, unexplained fatigue and sickness had been swiftly followed by convulsions, unconsciousness and death.
‘The doctors could do nothing. We had to watch as he slipped away from us.’
Despite all the deaths I had recently investigated, I had never heard a person sound so utterly desolate and I wondered if Miss Gwatkyn’s profound sadness – only now revealed to me – was written on her face, plain for those with sight to see.
‘My heart was broken. First by my son’s death and then by Leo’s decision to move to Italy. He had begun to cough before, but grief accelerated his illness. He said he couldn’t stay in London, couldn’t stay with me, that everything in our life together reminded him of Justin.’
She sat there, at the very edge of my vision, a small figure in a plain gown, a shawl about her shoulders. I wondered if her furred boots hid beneath the blanket which Mrs Griffiths had put over her guest’s lap to keep out the drawing room’s draughts.
‘My father had recently died so, as Lady of Alltybela, I could leave London and come home without attracting too much comment. And, being ill, it struck nobody as odd that Leo would go to Italy for his health.
‘So the die was cast. And thus it has remained for almost twenty years. I go to Italy to see Leo every winter. We are careful with each other. We talk about our son, the man he would be now. We cry. We walk about Naples. And I come home. Leo comes to London when he has paintings to sell and sometimes we see each other then, too. We remain married and neither of us wishes it otherwise. I have Alltybela and its people. He has Naples and his painting and such companionship as he chooses.’
I sat, watching the small, still figure, unable to think of a single thing to say.
Lydia, of course, spoke the words that should have come from me. ‘Miss Gwatkyn, I am so very sorry.’
‘Thank you, my dear. They say that time heals, but some things do not and should not heal. The extremity of grief for a child fades, of course. But the wound caused by such a death never truly heals. If it did, it would be to deny his place in my heart.’
‘It hardly seems appropriate,’ Lydia continued, ‘after such a sad story, to ask you about Nicholas Rowland…’
Phoebe Gwatkyn unclasped her hands and laid them flat on her lap as if preparing to rise. ‘Not at all. I came to try and help. Please ask whatever you like and I will answer if I can.’
‘You said that Nicholas Rowland came here at your husband’s recommendation,’ Lydia began. ‘Did they know each other well?’
Did a look pass between the two women as an acknowledgement of the delicacy of this question?
‘I believe they had known each other some while,’ Miss Gwatkyn replied. ‘There is a club, in London, to which both Leo and Nicholas belonged.’
She paused and I felt an acute discomfort. Was she looking at me, waiting for some sign?
‘Was the school Rowland’s idea?’ I asked, my voice creaky with embarrassment. ‘Or your husband’s?’
Miss Gwatkyn drew in an audible breath, as if she had a long story to tell.
‘Leo wrote to me after the publication of the Commissioners’ Report. He told me that his friend, Nicholas Rowland, was incensed to the point of fury by it. That he wanted to do something to counter the prejudice and calumnies it contained. To establish a school that would act as a beacon for Welsh education.’ She broke off to raise what must surely, by now, have been a cup of stone-cold tea to her lips. ‘Leo knew that the Unitarians had a strong presence in the area and that, as a denomination, they take a great interest in education. So he suggested that Nicholas consider setting his school in Llanddewi Brefi. When Nicholas heard about the history of education in the area, he decided that it was the perfect spot.’
‘Who did he hear that history from?’ I asked. ‘Was it from your husband, or did Montague Caldicot tell him?’
Miss Gwatkyn’s teacup rattled as she replaced it on its saucer, betraying feelings to me which must already have been quite evident to Lydia. ‘Nicholas was always very discreet. He told me that a gentleman with family in Cardiganshire supported the idea and had written letters of introduction for him, in the hope that other county families would support the school. But he never mentioned the gentleman by name.’
Given the action for which Caldicot had been cashiered, surely the club Nicholas Rowland and Leo Barton had belonged to must also be the link between Rowland and Caldicot?
‘But I think you must be right,’ Phoebe Gwatkyn continued, ‘about Montague Caldicot’s support. A few months ago, Nicholas confided in me that, after an encouraging start, enthusiasm for the collegiate school had begun to dwindle amongst the gentry. I assumed it was because of Tobias Hildon’s campaign for a National School and Nicholas did not contradict me. But now that their association is clear, I do wonder whether, in fact, Montague’s disgrace might have been the reason. You can appreciate that families might not want to be associated with something he championed.’
There was a knock at the door, followed by the scurrying figure of one of our maids, Elsie. Offering entirely superfluous apologies, she took one of the spills of tightly-rolled newspaper from the pot on the mantelpiece and proceeded to light the lamps. Lydia, seeing what she was about, lifted a lamp glass to raise the wick and check the oil. She would soon learn that Mrs Griffiths insisted on the lamps being seen to every morning, when the fires were laid.
‘You don’t need to get your hands dirty, Miss Howell,’ Elsie said, an edge of reproach in her voice. ‘That’s my job.’
I waited for Lydia to argue but she simply said, ‘I’m sorry, Elsie. You’re quite right, of course.’
The room lit, the girl left, but the lighting of the lamps was a reminder that, before long, we would be called in to dinner. I wished to finish this conversation before we were interrupted.
‘You won’t yet be aware, Miss Gwatkyn,’ I began, ‘but Montague Caldicot absented himself from the public meeting in Cardigan today, having sent me a note regretting that he must leave it to me. Nobody knows where he is.’
‘Leave it to you? What did he mean by that?’
‘I don’t know. He might have meant the meeting. Or the whole campaign.’ I paused in case she wished to respond but she said nothing. ‘His agent, of course, is refusing to see it in those terms. He’s insisting that the election proceeds towards the nomination meeting on Saturday.’
‘But you don’t think Montague will be back?’
I hesitated. The conversation had already taken turns I could not have foreseen and I was loath to push it still further beyond the bounds of decency. And yet … Miss Gwatkyn had c
ome to see me of her own free will and had volunteered the information about her husband and her marriage in the same spirit. ‘His disappearance came,’ I said, feeling my way, ‘after I told him that John Davies had gone to London in search of information that might see Rowland’s inquest re-opened.’
In my peripheral vision, Phoebe Gwatkyn did not move. She simply sat, her back straight, a now redundant cup and saucer clasped in her lap, waiting for me to continue. Did she know what I was going to ask her next?
‘I believe that Mr Caldicot knew – or feared – what John might find when he went to London. That whatever it was would destroy his reputation.’
‘And, as a consequence, he would be forced to withdraw from the election?’
‘At least that. Alternatively, that facts might come to light which, were they to be made public, would ensure that he had no future here.’ Or, perhaps, no future in the world at all.
‘What facts?’ For the first time, Miss Gwatkyn sounded troubled. ‘Do you believe that Montague Caldicot had something to do with Nicholas’s death?’
I shifted in my chair, profoundly wishing that I could ask my next question of anybody but this small, extraordinary woman.
‘As you know,’ I began, ‘the inquest heard that Mr Rowland had been observed going out, quite often, after dark. We can only assume that he was meeting somebody. Given certain other information I have received, together with what you have told us about Mr Rowland’s—’ I hesitated. ‘Preferences, it may be that he was meeting Montague Caldicot. Do you have any reason to believe that might be true?’
