The Tender Glory

by Jean S. MacLeod

  If it was no more than an easy-going canter she knew she mustn’t grumble. At least he was pulling some of his weight.

  Sterne looked deserted. She put the milk beside the step, sheltering it with a convenient stone. If Huntley had come to the door she might have been tempted to ask him about his offer to renew the scholarship, but there was no sign of life anywhere.

  Searching the shore, her eyes narrowed against the lifting spray, she wondered if he had gone down there to secure his lobster-pots, but the only movement among the rocks was the ceaseless shifting of the bird life. Cormorant and gannet, gull and kittiwake circled and wheeled, fighting for a sheltered place beneath the cliff. They knew the storm was coming.

  Alison drove swiftly towards the glen. A wind was rising and the trees moaned, tossing and swaying against it. The previous storm’s havoc was still evident, although most of the fallen timber had been lopped and piled on one side of the road, ready to be carted away. The shortcut through Calders tempted her. It would be quicker to go that way to the Lodge.

  Huntley had also been at work on the avenue. The pines which had leaned drunkenly against their neighbours were all felled and neatly trimmed, ready to be led to the road. At least, she thought, he hadn’t abandoned the amenities of the place to their fate. It was the house itself he avoided.

  Coming upon it round the final bend in the drive, she thought how lovely it looked, yet how sad. There could be nothing more desolate than a house which has been left to die. Calders had been a show-place, but now all the little signs of decay were beginning to appear: the unkempt appearance of the doorway; the deserted garden; a broken trellis; a shutter flapping in the wind.

  The ground floor rooms were all shuttered, barring any unauthorised entry. That was how Huntley wanted it to be.

  She drove on, feeling guilty of trespassing on his sorrow, yet feeling, too, that Calders was a house that ought to be lived in.

  Tessa was waiting for her when she reached the Lodge.

  “You take your time,” she remarked ungraciously. “I’ve promised Huntley breakfast and we’re short of milk.”

  “I’m sorry,” Alison apologised. “I had no idea I was late.”

  Tessa was in one of her less generous moods.

  “I hate getting up on a morning like this,” she grumbled. “I suppose the post will be late, too.”

  “He was delivering in the glen,” Alison told her. “The wind might make him a few minutes late, but he’ll get here eventually.”

  Tessa’s eyes went beyond her to the man approaching them from the road. Huntley had left the jeep outside the main gates.

  “I’m glad you’ve come back,” she said, the colour rising faintly to her cheeks. “I’ll soon have the bacon sizzling and Alison has brought us some eggs.”

  Alison felt dismissed.

  “I’ll push on,” she murmured awkwardly. “It looks as if we’re in for another storm.”

  She should have told him about the flapping shutter, she thought on her way back to Craigie Hill, but perhaps he would go to Calders after Tessa had made his breakfast. Surely he would inspect the house from time to time, especially in such inclement weather.

  The swinging shutter gave her no peace even when night came. It banged through her dreams to the violent accompaniment of the storm. Again and again she woke, hearing it in imagination, and lying for a long time afterwards, thinking of Calders weeping in the rain, thinking of Huntley and Leone, whom he still loved.

  Perhaps he would love her always, chained to her memory because she had been everything he desired in a woman, because their interests had been the same, their lives entwined by the silver chord of music which even death couldn’t sever.

  And Tessa? Where did she come in? Was he going to marry Tessa without loving her? Tessa had hinted as much, fighting her sister’s power, Tessa who could be harsh and unlovely at times because she was haunted by the thought of Leone.

  There seemed to be something disturbingly hidden about Tessa, something almost treacherous, like a dark stream running beneath the surface. While she still nurtured her resentment of Leone in the secret places of her heart she could be dangerous.

  Robin’s name haunted Alison and the memory of Huntley out there on the promontory, because now she had added her own quota of love to the maelstrom of emotions which swept the dark headlands surrounding Sterne. A thousand other follies would have better than that.

  Throughout the night the storm heightened and well into the following day. A mighty raging of water followed her wherever she went, and then, suddenly, it ceased. She hadn’t attempted to deliver the milk to Sterne during the morning, but once the wind had dropped she had no excuse. When the van’s engine stalled on the bridge over the gushing Calder she felt defeated. She would have to walk.

  Allowing the van to run into the side of the road, she grasped a bottle of milk and took the short-cut through the estate.

  Water ran everywhere, seeping through the trees and rushing in the ditches. The sodden earth on either side of the drive would take no more. Calders, when she reached it, looked damp and miserable, with the open shutter hanging drunkenly on one hinge. There was nothing she could do about it, but an odd instinct which had nothing to do with curiosity took her round to the back of the house.

  In this direction Calders had faced the full onslaught of the storm. All the windows on the east side looked out across the terrace to the North Sea, and evidence of the night’s wild havoc was everywhere. Trellises were down and an arm from a nearby tree had been flung by the wind against the house itself. It had torn the shutter from a downstairs window, shattering the glass and scattering fragments of wood across the wet paving-stones. A velvet curtain, torn out at the height of the storm’s fury, hung damp and bedraggled on the broken frame.

  There wasn’t much she could do apart from attempting to close the window and reporting the damage at the Lodge on her way back.

  Tugging at the curtain, she managed to free it. There was broken glass everywhere and it snapped like a pistol-shot each time she trod on it. The room beyond looked like a battlefield. If a typhoon had struck Calders there couldn’t have been much more damage. Lamps had been overturned and vases lay on the floor. Near the window the dust-sheet had been whipped from a magnificent grand piano and draped almost elegantly across a nearby chair. The piano itself was wet and already marked by rain.

  Instinctively she went towards it, stepping over the low window sill. It was a beautiful instrument and she could think of nothing but the fact that it was being destroyed.

  Lifting the dust-sheet, she began to mop up the surplus water from the highly-polished case, completely unaware of the man who watched her through the half-open doorway leading to the hall.

  Miraculously the dust-sheet had remained dry. Blown across the chair, it was out of the path of the rain and it served her well. The piano was dry if not exactly shining by the time she had finished with it.

  Straightening the overturned lamps, she paused for a moment to look about her. It was a lovely room, long and exquisitely furnished, with a large open fireplace at one end and double doors leading to the south side of the terrace at the other. Softly carpeted in rose pink, it had a warmth which even its present desolation couldn’t destroy. It was a room meant to be lived in.

  Beyond, through the half-open door leading to the hall, there was further disarray. She caught a glimpse of packing-cases stacked one on top of the other and what seemed like the framework of a bed. The cases looked as if they had just been delivered and her heart missed a beat as she looked at them. New furniture for a bride!

  Turning hastily away, she tried to crush down the lump in her throat, but it persisted. Calders might be waiting for Tessa to put the finishing touches to it. Calders and Huntley.

  She wanted to run from the room, to run and run until she dropped from exhaustion, but there was still the piano to think about. Closing a broken window would do little good and there was nothing to cover it with except the
dust-sheet, which was now far too wet.

  Slowly she lifted the lid, running her fingers over the keys in a rippling chord. The notes vibrated in her heart, weakening her resolve to flee. It was the first time she had touched a keyboard since her return, the first time in almost two months. Eagerly, instinctively her hands lay on the keys while a deluge of music flooded her mind. The rhapsodies, the minuets, the water music, the cradle songs of great composers filled the room, blotting out time and place. Magnificent concertos rent the air with sound and fury. Greig, her favourite, battled with the elements to reproduce the thunder of the sea. Mendelssohn offered a bridal march.

  All about her the house lay waiting. When she began to play its loneliness seemed to vanish together with her own ungovernable regret. She played as she had never played before. All the frustration of loss, all the agony of love unreturned was there in each unhesitating note. It was a relief, a blunting of the pain to pour it all out through the medium she loved the most.

  Then, gently, quietly, when the wild concertos had run their course, the lullabies and the minuets took their place. She played softly, beautifully, her thoughts far away. The music stole out into a garden replete with rain.

  Then, harshly, as if the whole world had collapsed, something crashed on to the piano. She drew her hands away as the lid came down over the keyboard, slammed shut on the music she had made. She saw a man’s clenched fist and the unutterable anger in his face before she found the courage to speak.

  “Huntley, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to come.”

  He turned from her, hiding the fury in his eyes. “Why did you?”

  It was a voice she had never heard before, racked with passion and despair.

  “I had to.” She could only tell him the truth. “Something made me come. Yesterday there was a shutter slamming at one of the windows. I wasn’t sure whether you knew about it or not, and today it was still flapping on one hinge. Then—I wondered about this side of the house. I had no right—I realise that now— but it didn’t seem to matter at the time. I found the piano. Everything was sodden with rain. I tried to dry it all up, but I should have told you first, or reported it at the Lodge.”

  “I was here,” he said. “I knew about the window.”

  “Here?” she looked at him in bewilderment. “Then—why didn’t you try to stop me? I must have played for over an hour. Surely—surely you couldn’t have been here all the time?”

  “I saw you come in,” he said, the words harsh in his throat. “I didn’t know why, although I had a fair idea.” He straightened, turning to face her. “The power of music,” he said in a frozen voice. “Who can reject it or deny it the odd sacrifice now and then? You play beautifully,” he added coldly. “We mustn’t allow such an obvious talent to go to waste. When your mother is well enough you must go back to London.”

  He had dismissed her with a promise of help. He imagined that all she wanted, all she would ever desire, was within his power to give. Mocking laughter choked against her throat. How true that was, although her heart’s desire wasn’t to be found in London any more.

  “We can talk about it when the time comes.” She faced him with the best effort she could make at a smile. “You’re being more than considerate. I hope I can justify your trust.”

  He looked down at her, as if he were seeing her for the first time.

  “I’ve no doubt you will,” he said harshly. “And now, if you’ll let me clear up the damage, I’ll go back with you for the van.”

  “It broke down,” she explained, picking up broken glass on her hands and knees. She was determined to help, whether he liked it not. “The wretched thing’s always letting me down.”

  It was a relief to talk about everyday matters, a lessening of the tension between them which she recognised when he smiled.

  “It’s time you had a new one. Couldn’t your friend Orbister help in that respect?” he suggested. “He’s in the garage business, isn’t he?”

  “Not quite.” The thought of Jim brought normality to a situation which was completely beyond her. “He hopes to enlarge his hire service before he tries anything more ambitious, but I think he’ll open his own garage eventually. It’s what he wants most, I think.”

  He looked as if he might ask her something further, but appeared to change his mind. Alison glanced through the door into the hall.

  “If we had something to cover the piano,” she suggested, “it would help to keep it dry till you get the window repaired. Something heavier than a dust-sheet.”

  “The answer might be to move it altogether.” He put a couple of chairs to one side. “Over here it would be out of range if we did get another storm, which I doubt.” She helped him to wheel the piano towards the centre of the room, her fingers caressing the dark wood, as if it had been alive.

  “It ought to be dried out properly,” she said without thinking. “It ruins an instrument, leaving it in a damp room for any length of time.”

  He stiffened perceptibly.

  “I haven’t time to come lighting dead fires at Calders,” he said brusquely.

  “Was it your mother’s piano?” she asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Perhaps, if we could light one fire—”

  Her suggestion fell into a long silence.

  “I’m sorry,” she apologised at last. “It was only a thought. It seems such a pity to let a lovely instrument deteriorate, even gradually.” “Look for something to cover it,” he said, “and I’ll bring some wood. I suppose a fire wouldn’t do any harm, once in a while. You’ll find a rug of some sort in one of the other rooms which might do to cover it for the time being. I don’t suppose I’ll be able to get the glass renewed for a day or two.”

  She followed him through the hall, avoiding the packing cases standing almost against the great main door.

  Where they had been delivered, she thought, seeing them clearly for the first time. Each crate bore the name of a well-known furnishing house in Aberdeen. Huntley passed them by without seeming to see them at all, as if they had been there for a very long time.

  “In there,” he directed, indicating a door on the far side of the hall. “You’ll find a Persian rug on the wall.”

  “Oh, but surely—” she protested.

  He shrugged.

  “If it saves the piano,” he said, “I’ll get it down for you.”

  “A travelling rug would do,” she pointed out.

  “They’re packed away somewhere. This won’t take more than a few seconds.”

  He reached up, prising the rug from its fastenings until it fell at their feet.

  “It’s beautiful,” Alison murmured, picking it up. “So soft and light!”

  “Another sacrifice of time and eyesight.”

  “Why do you pretend to be such a barbarian?” She faced him in the light from the door. “You do love this sort of thing, but—for some reason—you won’t admit it. You won’t allow yourself to be touched by beauty.”

  He held the door wide open.

  “Shall we say I’ve been cured of sentiment,” he suggested. “Beauty, like love and torture, can be devastating. It can leave nothing but a hard core of indifference behind it.”

  She felt stunned by the bleakness of his outlook, his utter submission to grief.

  “Surely there must be something left,” she said impulsively. “We can’t live out our lives hounded by despair.”

  “There are other things,” he granted.

  “Such as?”

  “Oh—work and ambition, I suppose, and a determination to live one’s own life in one’s own way.”

  “A selfish, hermit’s existence?” The criticism had escaped her involuntarily.

  “If you like.” He seemed almost amused. “It has its compensations, you know.”

  She followed him down a passage to the kitchens. “This house,” she said impulsively. “Couldn’t it offer a sort of compensation, too?”

  He went through to the scullery to pick up wood and coal.


  “I’m not looking for recompense,” he told her. “When I come back to Calders it will be because I have to come.

  I don’t intend to let it rot or fall down about my ears. I’m fully conscious of my obligations, here and elsewhere.”

  “You mean—you’ll marry eventually?” Her voice sounded quite steady as she walked beside him to the drawing-room, carrying the rug. “It—must be expected of you. Calders has been in your family for years.”

  “For four generations,” he agreed. “Perhaps I owe it something, after all.”

  He hadn’t answered her direct question. He hadn’t confirmed the fear in her heart. Only Tessa had hinted that he intended to marry her.

  While he lit a fire in the wide grate at the far end of the room she covered up the piano, tracing the delicate bird and flower pattern on the beautiful wool rug with a finger that shook. How could he be so indifferent to so many lovely things?

  The wood, at least, was dry. It roared and sparked between the ancient andirons, sending shafts of vivid fire up the chimney and a glow of light and warmth into the waiting room.

  “How quickly a house responds to warmth!” she mused, sitting on the edge of a winged armchair on the far side of the hearth. “It’s the original source of life, isn’t it?”

  He looked at her, still half turned towards the fire. “Of contentment, anyway,” he said. “We can all learn to be reasonably content.”

  “Because it’s a half-measure?”

  “If you like. Life can be composed of half-measures.” “You’re so wrong!” The colour had risen in her cheeks. “We never truly accept such a theory,” she argued. “Wasn’t there

  hope at the bottom of Pandora’s box?” “The hope that things might turn out well, after all?” He smiled. “But you’re an optimist, Alison. You can even smile in the face of despair.”

  “My own despair?” She looked at him in the leaping orange light from the fire. “If you mean my career I have every hope of taking it up again. You’ve just made that possible by promising your help.”