“Thinking what?”
“I was thinking we might sail to New York sooner rather than later. To see your family. I’m sure you must miss them intolerably, after all, and I, for one, should very much like to meet them. What do you think of that?”
New York. The two words settled on my chest.
“Oh! I don’t—I hadn’t thought of that.”
“What? Don’t you want to see them again?”
“Yes! But I was thinking—I was really thinking we might just have them come to visit us, instead. Here in Cornwall.”
“In Cornwall?”
“Aren’t we going to live here? In Penderleath? Near your family?”
He lifted his right hand from the wheel and fumbled for the cigarettes in his jacket pocket. “That wasn’t the plan, no. Anywhere but here, really. It’s going to be bloody awkward around old Fitzwilliam Manor for the foreseeable future, for one thing. That’s why I was thinking about New York. I daresay your family would be over the moon to see you again, after so long. Especially after the accident. And I should hope they’d like to meet me. The English gent who’s swept you off your feet.”
He was having trouble with the matches. I took the matchbook and the cigarette from his fingers and bent down under the dashboard to strike the flame. Several tries later, I handed Simon the cigarette, trailing a fragile line of smoke from one end.
“Thanks awfully, darling.” He transferred the cigarette to his right hand, which was propped on the doorframe while his left hand operated the steering wheel. He inhaled quietly and glanced again at the side of my face. “To be perfectly honest, I seem to have developed the most powerful desire to make an entirely fresh start in life. Leave this damned war-weary continent behind. All these terrible memories, these ghosts upon ghosts.”
“But what about your profession? What will you do?”
“I don’t know. Something. Not medicine.”
“Why not? You were born to be a doctor.”
“Was I? Maybe the old Simon was.” He rubbed the corner of his mouth with his thumb. “Now it turns my stomach. It does. The idea of opening some damned surgical practice in London. The smell of blood and antiseptic. I’m sick to death, Virginia.”
I stared at his left hand, ridged and bony beneath its leather glove. The first two fingers, pointing upward, pinning the cigarette between them, tremble visibly. Or maybe that was just the vibration of the motor? Sick to death, he said, and I remember his lean, bare shoulders as he made love to me the night before, his silvering hair, the graceful hollows beneath his cheekbones.
“Well? What do you think?” he said.
“I think—well, of course we should visit New York, if you like.”
“But not to live there?”
“It’s just—oh, Simon. I do hope . . . you see, I don’t think I want to live there anymore. I don’t think I can. I thought—I thought instead that . . . but I didn’t want to say anything, not until I’d spoken to her . . .”
“Spoken to whom?”
“Sophie. My sister. I thought we could invite her here, to live with us.”
“Oh.”
“Do you think that’s a terrible idea?”
“No, of course not. She’s welcome, if she wants to come.” His thumb tapped the wheel. “What sort of girl is she? You don’t speak of her very much.”
“She’s a darling. Lovely and absent-minded and mechanical.”
“Mechanical?” He smiled.
“Yes, she takes after our father that way. But she’s not like him otherwise. She’s really very sweet. I think you’ll adore her.”
“I’m sure I shall. But will she want to move to England? Awfully long way, you know, and most everything’s still rationed. Everything worth eating, anyway. Besides, I’m sure she has her friends in New York.”
“Not really. We weren’t encouraged to have friends, Sophie and me.”
“What’s that? Why not?”
“Because of our circumstances.” I looked down at my hands in my lap, gloved like his, except in black leather instead of brown. “My father.”
“Ah. Yes. I’m sorry. I’d forgotten about that. Not forgotten exactly, but—”
“But you understand? Why I’d rather live anywhere else than there?”
He made a noise that might have suggested anything. Sucked on the cigarette, briefly inspected the remaining stub. “About your father.”
“What about him?”
“Well, what sort of fellow is he? Apt, for example, to greet sons-in-law with suspicion or generosity? What’s his attitude toward this reckless foreign marriage of yours?”
“I don’t know.” I found the ring on my fourth finger, underneath the glove, and twisted it back and forth. Such a strange, alien thing, a piece of metal bound around a piece of your body. I had never worn a ring before. “I haven’t told him about you.”
There was a brief, stunned silence.
“You’re joking, aren’t you?”
“No. He’s not—as you know, as I’ve said before, he’s suspicious of outsiders. We weren’t allowed to make friends, at least the kind of friends we could invite home. So I didn’t know how to explain. How to make him understand that you could be trusted. I thought he might forbid me to marry you. Order me home at once.”
“So you went ahead and married me anyway?”
I tried to laugh. “I did once hear that it’s far better to ask forgiveness than permission.”
“Yes, but that’s . . .” He crushed the spent cigarette against the doorframe and tossed it into the draft. “Marriage is rather a larger matter, you know. Are you saying you haven’t mentioned my existence at all? What about your sister? Surely you’ve told her.”
“No. I was afraid she would blurt something out. She can be impulsive.”
“My God.” He grasped the brim of his hat and worked it up and down against his forehead. “I suppose he’ll be furious at us both.”
“I don’t know. That’s why—”
“What’s that?”
I raised my voice, which had fallen into hoarseness. “Why I thought we might make our home here, at least for now. Live here and send for Sophie.”
“I see.”
“You don’t approve.”
“I just think it’s a bit shortsighted, that’s all. You’re not afraid he might—well, cut you off?”
“Cut me off?”
“Leave you without a penny. Or whatever it is you have in America.”
“Pennies. I wouldn’t care about that. I couldn’t take his money, anyway.”
“What? Why the devil not?”
“We can make our own fortune.”
“You make it sound so easy. Have you ever tried to get your hands on a decent sum of money? Enough to set yourself up in reasonable comfort? It’s bloody difficult. It’s going to be even more difficult now, with the war over, and everybody out of work.”
“I’d rather be poor than take Father’s money.”
Simon lifted his hand back to his forehead and rubbed his thumb against his skin, just beneath the brim of his hat. “Would you, now,” he said, so softly that I had to strain to hear him over the noise of the engine. “May I ask why?”
The road grew rough, winding about a set of small hills. The draft whistled past our ears. Simon slowed the car and put both hands back on the wheel, gripping it with such intensity that his knuckles seemed to burst beneath the brown leather of his gloves.
Tell him, I thought. Tell him why you’re afraid.
Tell him the thing you haven’t told anyone. The thing you haven’t told Sophie.
The thing you haven’t even told yourself.
I stared at those hands, at the tight bones of his knuckles, and said, “There’s no reason. I suppose it’s just because I want a new life, too. I want a fresh start. A fresh start with you and Sophie. That’s all.”
I don’t suppose I’ll ever forget the sight of Penderleath, glimpsed between a pair of overgrown elms as we crept around the fina
l curve of the drive. Fitzwilliam Manor, Simon had called it, in his jaded voice, but I thought it was beautiful in its damp, crumbling humility.
“I see they’ve given up on the north wing,” Simon said. A few drops of rain spat upon the windscreen, and he reached for the dashboard.
“What’s in the north wing?”
“The nursery, for one thing. And the billiards.”
“But I thought Lydia’s money was supposed to save the house.”
“Yes. Well. As it turned out, there wasn’t so much money as my parents hoped. The fortune was all cleverly tied up by the lawyers. And her father lost a few ships to the damned U-boats, apparently, and required the capital himself. A thing he never troubled himself to mention, of course. We only discovered the extent of the mess after his death.” He paused to switch gears. “And then came the divorce proceedings.”
“Oh, God.”
“Not your fault.”
“But in the eyes of your parents . . .”
Simon slammed his foot on the brake pedal. The Wolseley skidded to a stop, rear wheels sliding along the mud. He turned and caught the back of my head. “You are not to care what my parents think,” he said fiercely. “You are not to believe a word they say, do you hear me? Leave them to me. I know how to manage them.”
“Are they really so awful?”
“They’re not awful. They’re only . . . they’re bitter. And rather furious with me.”
“Then why are we here? Why not wait?”
“God knows.” His hand turned gentle and stroked my cheek. “Maybe just to show you what it could be, one day, when it’s ours. The way I’ve dreamed it. Central heating and sound roofs and bricks all repointed. Fresh paint and new furniture and children running about. And love, Virginia. Just imagine it.”
I looked over his shoulder at the ancient gray dimensions of Penderleath, the comfortable jumble of Palladian symmetry and Jacobean fretwork, all softened up by age and weather. “I think it’s perfect the way it is.”
He barked and put the car back in gear. “That’s because you haven’t been inside.”
Nobody came out to greet us as we pulled up in the exact center of the drive, before the pilloried entrance. The gravel was patchy and ragged with weeds. Simon switched off the engine and went around to open my door.
“What’s the matter?” I said, touching his chin.
“Nothing. Come along, Mrs. Fitzwilliam. Into the lion’s den.”
He led me around the car and up the crumbling steps. “I suppose I ought to carry you over the threshold, but it’s not really ours yet. Nor especially homelike, for that matter. Still . . .” He flung open the door, grasped my waist, and swooped me inside. His voice boomed about the entrance hall. “Mother! Father! The prodigal returns.”
“Don’t joke,” I whispered.
“I’m not joking.”
No answering voice reached us from inside. The atmosphere was cold and damp and uninhabited, smelling of mildew and something else, sweet and slightly rancid. Simon released my waist and gathered up my hand inside his. “I’d offer to take your coat, my dear, but I daresay you’ll need it.”
“But where is everyone?”
“Sitting resolutely in the conservatory, I imagine. Wrapped in old furs. Drinking tea and setting their teeth against us. I shall have to work every wile to thaw them out.”
“Your brother said you were good at that. Getting your parents on your side.”
“Well, they’re very much like children themselves, you know. Utterly incapable of dealing with practicalities, like the size of the overdraft and the necessity for paying one’s tradesmen. Buying coal over buying new evening frocks. Improving one’s estate as an investment for the future.”
We passed along a long, dark gallery, papered in striped Victorian burgundy and shrouded by portraits of murky ancestors. A thick film of dust coated the windowpanes, adding an unnecessary layer of gloom. “Do you see what I mean?” Simon said. “If all this were cleaned up and brightened. See that plasterwork, ruined by damp. It’s a disgrace, really. And it was once the most magnificent house for miles. Look at this portrait, here.”
He stopped before a painting, larger than the others, framed in gilt. The dusky air nearly swallowed the subject, so that I could make out only a crimson dress and a sumptuous abundance of creamy skin.
“Who is she?”
“Augusta Fitzwilliam. Married my great-whatever-it-is grandfather when she was just fifteen. She made the family’s fortune, three or so centuries ago. Mostly on her back, so the legend goes. She was an ardent Royalist. Look how beautiful she is.”
I peered forward and saw a pair of large eyes—color indeterminate—and a firm, well-crafted chin. Hair the color of honey, hidden behind a gold headpiece. For an instant, her face reminded me of Simon’s.
“She was the mistress of Charles II, for a time. He quite adored her, or so I was told, and not just because she was such a beauty. She was a terribly brave woman. Kept the house as a refuge for the Royalists during the war, despite several attempts by Parliament to arrest her. Hid him for the night, so the story goes, on his way to exile in France, when he was only about sixteen. Naturally she fell into bed with him once he returned. Most women did, if he wanted them, especially the pretty ones. But I believe she fucked him on principle. Doing her bit for the monarchy.”
“Didn’t her husband object?”
“I imagine he had little to say about it. After all, they were both rewarded handsomely when the king was restored to the throne. The house was left crumbling to bits after the war—much as it is now, what irony—and Charles chucked a grateful pile of gold their way, so who was Mr. Fitzwilliam to complain? This was his king, after all. He did refuse a title for his wife’s services, however. He had his pride.”
“It all sounds so venal.”
“Well, of course it was venal. Most human acts are venal, to some degree. But it did the trick, didn’t it? Saved the house and the fortune for generations to come, when the Roundheads nearly destroyed them.” He paused. “Besides, it wasn’t as if she didn’t care for him. They carried on for years. She had at least three children by him. In fact, the eldest of them ended up inheriting after his half-brother went to London and died of the plague, so we’re really not Fitzwilliams at all. Properly speaking, I suppose, we’re Fitzcharleses.”
“What?”
“Yes. I’m a prince, of sorts. At your service.” He made a little bow.
“I don’t believe it. King Charles was your grandfather?”
“Well, most likely. Several greats ago, of course. You look so astonished.”
“I am astonished! It’s—it’s amazing. You’re—his blood runs in your veins! Why didn’t you say something before? Doesn’t it amaze you?”
“I don’t know. It’s just a fact to me. Something I’ve known all my life. I suppose it is rather extraordinary, to an outsider.” Simon returned to the portrait. “Though I daresay there are thousands of us, scattered around the country. He was a damned promiscuous bloke, and a generous one. Let that be a lesson to everyone. It pays to tip well.”
“You sound as if you approve.”
“Not exactly. But it was a different age, you know. I don’t see the harm in it, if everyone got what they wanted out of it. Husbands, wives, and king.”
I blurted out: “But if it were me? Would you care then?”
He was still holding my hand. I thought I felt his fingers move around mine, in a slight spasm. “What a strange thing to ask.”
“You know what I mean.”
Simon’s hand released mine, just long enough to tuck my arm inside the nook of his elbow. “You must know the answer to that,” he said quietly, and he turned us both away from the portrait, down the remainder of the gallery. The shabby carpet muffled our steps, until we came to a large, rectangular drawing room, flanked at both ends by tall, mullioned window seats. The furniture was covered in yellowing sheets.
“Oh, how beautiful!” I said.
I joined him and rested my head on his shoulder. I loved his old tweed jacket, the absence of his army tunic. The material smelled of wool and cigarettes and camphor—it had spent most of the war in a wardrobe, locked in battle against moths—and I remember thinking how comfortable a combination that was, how perfectly evocative of Simon. I remember thinking how that scent would always belong to him. Always belong to our life together.
“We’ll make it beautiful again,” I said. “We’ll do whatever we must.”
He put his arm around me. “Yes. Whatever we must.”
I don’t recall how long we stood there, gazing out the grubby windows at the gardens beyond, overgrown and weedy and coated in mist. The damp crept through the cracks in the windows and filled the air. I pressed my cheek against the dry warmth of Simon’s tweed shoulder—I recall that detail clearly, because it was the last sensation of comfort I was to receive for a terribly long time.
Whatever the period of time we stood—a minute, ten minutes—the interruption inevitably came. Simon heard it first. I felt his arm stiffen, and an instant later I heard the signal, too: the clatter of footsteps down a flight of wooden stairs.
“Samuel! Is that you?” called the voice of a young woman.
We turned together, Simon and I, and I was about to ask him whose voice this was—who this young woman could possibly be—when its owner flew around a corner and into view before us, light and miniature as a fairy, wearing a gray dress and a stained white pinafore apron. She stopped at once and put one hand to her mouth, and I saw that a white surgical mask dangled from the side of her face, while her hair was bound in a white scarf.
“Clara,” said Simon. His voice seemed a little cold. “How good to see you.”
“Simon! What are you doing here? Is that—?”
“My wife. We were married the day before yesterday. Virginia, darling, this is my sister. Clara.”
“Hello,” I said.
Clara looked at me and at Simon. I remember thinking how plain she looked, how lank her hair and how large her mouth, but I now believe that was only because she was so pale and wan, because the skin beneath her eyes was bruised with fatigue.
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