by Dorothy Eden
To George, with his blurred brain, everything that moved in the dark was an enemy. She found she didn’t dare to go back. She had to go to the left, in the direction of the lake, leaving the half-formed track behind and plunging through the nettles and fallen logs and drifts of dead leaves. It couldn’t be very far. She would come out on the far side of the lake directly opposite the pavilion. She had been crazy to come here so late in the day. She shouldn’t have waited for Nolly to talk, she should have come immediately the rain had stopped.
Had that other person come then, and waited ever since?
She didn’t stop to listen now for pursuing footsteps. She was intent only in bursting out of the copse, as out of prison. Her skirts would be ruined. She would have to ask Uncle Edgar for another dress. She would have to explain she had ruined this one in running away from his son, and Lady Arabella would tell him not to be so foolish as to encourage her to run away from George, let George have his way…
The light hadn’t gone from the sky after all. When Fanny at last emerged only a few yards from the lake she saw that the water held the last glow of sunset, and was the colour of candlelight. It looked beautiful and reassuring, and even warm. And a few yards away a figure stood motionless, watching her.
Fanny froze. She could feel her feet sinking into the damp rushy ground. She couldn’t have turned and run. Her breath had left her.
‘Fanny! Whatever are you doing bursting out of the woods like a witch.’ Adam Marsh was standing over her. ‘Your hair is tumbling down.’
‘What are you doing here?’
‘Reflecting, in the quiet of the evening. But my aunt will be getting impatient. It’s time we were leaving.’
‘Weren’t you in the copse?’
‘A short time ago, yes?’
She searched his face, his figure. She saw that he was perfectly calm, that his clothing was unruffled, no dead leaves clung to his trousers as they did to her skirts.
‘I thought someone was there,’ she said uneasily.
He looked over her head to the dark line of the trees.
‘Perhaps there was. I believe we’ve all been down at one time or another searching for Nolly’s scarecrow. Or perhaps it was that wild pig your uncle said was there.’
‘Uncle Edgar said there was a wild pig?’
‘Both he and George and one of the gardeners found indisputable evidence, I believe. So there is Nolly’s ghost.’ His eyes searched her. ‘And what did you find?’
‘Nothing at all. It was too dark.’
‘What did the child finally tell you?’
‘Oh, only some exaggerated story about a black bird. Nolly has this unnatural fear of birds. I’m afraid it’s Great-aunt Arabella’s fault. I expect it was a crow or a starling. Nolly has a weakness for exaggerating. But I wanted to reassure myself, all the same.’
‘And you didn’t reassure yourself?’
‘I thought someone followed me.’
Adam took her arm.
‘It wasn’t me. It should have been. Pin up your hair, my dear. Or we will look guilty when we are innocent.’
She was still too disturbed and distressed to notice the regret in his voice.
19
‘WELL, AUNT, WHAT DID you think of her?’
‘She’s a nice enough child. Empty-headed, of course.’
‘Empty-headed! Fanny!’
‘How was I to know which one you meant. You give so much attention to the other.’
They stared at each other across the jolting carriage. Adam saw the humorous gleam in his aunt’s eyes and knew that she hadn’t been missing anything. He laughed softly, in appreciation.
‘And sometimes at that I fancy Miss Amelia isn’t so empty-headed.’
‘She must be if she is taken in by you.’
Adam stopped laughing, and frowned.
‘Yes. That’s what I hope and count on. Then she won’t be hurt too deeply. But don’t you agree that I must go on. There is something. That child wasn’t in a state of absolute terror today over nothing at all.’
Miss Marsh leaned forward.
‘What do you imagine it was?’
‘Not the wild boar everyone is talking about. Although I grant you there were traces of a boar. I saw them myself. No, I haven’t the slightest idea, aunt. Or if I have, it’s too fantastic to put into words. No, no, aunt, I don’t know. I thought I was in the copse before anybody else, but there was nothing to find, nothing that hadn’t flown away.’
‘If you ask me, Adam, it’s time you stopped being so secretive.’
‘No, I disagree entirely. As I explained to you, it isn’t only the children, it’s Fanny.’
‘Tut, boy! You have no grounds whatever for your suspicions. Besides, Fanny is a grown woman, and by the look of her, very capable of taking care of herself. The children—’
Miss Marsh sighed, it seemed with longing. ‘You shouldn’t have let Mr Barlow get away like that without having it out with him.’
‘How was I to know he would behave like that? Like a sulky child, not like a man at all. Good lord!’
Miss Marsh tapped his knee with her fan.
‘And how would you behave in similar circumstances?’
Adam looked out of the window at the darkening moor.
‘You must have noticed her beauty, aunt,’ he said in a low voice.
‘I have noticed that, and all her other qualities. You have my sympathy, but not my patience. I’m nervous, Adam. I confess it. Find out whatever it is you have to, and be done with it.’
‘Another two months,’ Adam murmured. ‘I don’t think it can be any longer than that.’
‘Winter,’ said Miss Marsh. ‘The leaves fallen, that old house full of draughts. Rain, wind, snow. Why must we wait until the winter?’
‘Because that is when Fanny becomes of age.’
20
IT WAS LATER THAT Fanny thought how strange it was that Adam Marsh seemed always to be there at the unexpected moment. On the railway station on that first day of all, in the church in the village, at the lake in the dusk when she had been so frightened, and when the other men had been indoors—or were when they themselves returned. All those meetings could not have been accidental. Perhaps none of them had been…
Once she had had the thought that he was watching over the children, because, having come to their rescue on their arrival in England, he fancied he had some responsibility for them. But lately he had seemed always to look first at her. If he were trying to warn her about something, why didn’t he tell her what it was? Or didn’t he know? Was he, too, haunted by this feeling of premonition?
Nothing was different, and yet somehow everything was. Nolly had never quite recovered her spirits since her mysterious fright, for some time she refused to be left alone and cried at a shadow moving. It was never established exactly what she had seen, but it seemed certain it had been a wild pig, for Uncle Edgar organised a shoot a few days later and two boars and a sow were slaughtered.
Lady Arabella told her rumbustious stories, as usual, and was in high good spirits when the children visited her, letting them handle all her treasures, and even coax Ludwig to play with a ball of wool. But she ended every session with the words, ‘I’m so glad, Fanny, you had the good sense to send that little red fox of a man back where he came from. We’ll keep her safely here, children, won’t we?’ Later, she had secret sessions with the children from which Fanny was excluded. It was something to do with making her a birthday present, an occupation that made Nolly’s eyes shine with happy importance.
Amelia was quite openly talking of an Easter wedding, although no one had yet proposed to her. Her thoughts were easy enough to read. And George, with just a shade more confidence and possessiveness, kept trying to persuade Fanny to bring the children down to the stables where they could grow accustomed to the horses before beginning riding lessons. He was shrewd enough to know that that was the only way he might persuade her to go with him, since she refused to be in his compan
y alone.
Aunt Louisa had dismissed Miss Egham, and told Fanny that if she needed a good workaday gown to wear in the schoolroom she was at liberty to choose the material and make it herself. That was the way the wind blew in that quarter. Poor Aunt Louisa, Fanny thought, stuck with her unwelcome niece after all, but perhaps making the best of it, since when Amelia married the house would be very quiet.
Uncle Edgar was exactly as he had been before the Hamish Barlow episode, affable, good-tempered, laughing just as heartily at his own jokes, becoming a little more conceited, perhaps, in his dress, and showing a great propensity for social occasions. There were always visitors at Darkwater, or the carriage was ordered for some dinner party or another. Uncle Edgar vowed every morning that he was exhausted, worn out, too old for all these gaieties, but that it was his duty to arrange them for the sake of the girls.
That was the subtle difference. Whereas previously Fanny had been allowed to make excuses for her absence, now Uncle Edgar insisted that she accompany them everywhere.
‘You know why Papa is behaving like this,’ Amelia said. ‘He’s giving you another chance to find a husband. He’s quite forgiven you, you see. He’s so kind-hearted, dear Papa.’
But Fanny didn’t think that was the reason at all. She thought that Uncle Edgar was merely making it publicly known once more how generous and worthy a man he was, and how sincerely he loved the waifs thrust on him. It would have broken his heart if his dearest Fanny had gone to live in far-off China…
It was the only way she could reconcile his present fond demeanour with his previous emphatic insistence that if she did not marry Hamish Barlow she would never be forgiven.
The letter with the London postmark arrived for her one late October morning when she had just returned from a walk with the children. Usually all mail was taken to Uncle Edgar who enjoyed distributing it, though the bulk of it was for himself. But today Amelia happened to be there when the postman arrived, and caught sight of Fanny’s name on the top envelope.
‘Fanny!’ she shrieked. ‘Have you an admirer you’ve never told me about? Do you think this is from Mr Barlow? Do open it quickly and tell me.’
Her interest was forgiveable. Fanny never received letters. There had been no one from whom to receive them. And the London postmark was highly intriguing.
Fanny’s own fingers trembled as she tore open the envelope. The thin delicate writing didn’t look like a man’s. Mr Barlow didn’t come to her mind. She had no clue to the writer, only again this unreasonable disquiet.
The thick sheet of notepaper was open in her hand. She read, My dear Miss Davenport, You will not perhaps recognise my name since I have been retired for some years, and am now a very old man. But as your late father’s attorney and friend, I would like to extend to you my very best wishes on your coming of age. Indeed, since I have not seen you since you were virtually a baby, I have an old man’s whim that you might, when you next make the journey to London, call on me at my house in Hanover Square. I have no doubt that under your uncle’s excellent guardianship you have bloomed. It would please me to see this with my own eyes. Would you be so kind as to bear the thought in mind? Your obedient servant, Timothy J. Craike.
It was like a hand reaching out from the past. Someone who had known her father, and perhaps her mother. Fanny had to read the letter twice to assimilate its contents, and then, forgetting all propriety, she went flying into the library.
‘Uncle Edgar! Oh, I am so glad to find you here!’
‘I scarcely had time to disappear, since you gave me no warning,’ said her uncle dryly.
‘I’m sorry. I should have knocked. I was so excited. Look, Uncle Edgar! I have a letter. Read it!’
She thrust the sheet of notepaper at Uncle Edgar, wondering for the first time as she waited impatiently for him to read the thin careful writing, why he had never mentioned Mr Craike to her.
But in a moment he had unwittingly explained her doubt,
‘God bless my soul, I thought the old man dead long ago.’
‘Then you know him, Uncle Edgar?’
‘Certainly. He attended to your father’s affairs after his death. But it’s years now since I had occasion to see him, and as he was an old man then I’d no idea he was still alive. Let me see, he must be as near ninety as anything.’
‘Then how wonderful of him to remember me. Oh, I should like to meet him.’
‘For a young woman who seems to show a remarkable scorn for males of her own age, I find this deep interest in a gentleman approaching his century very strange.’
‘Uncle, please be serious!’ Fanny begged. ‘It isn’t Mr Craike I’m interested in. He remembers my father, and perhaps my mother. I should dearly like to talk about them to him.’
Uncle Edgar clasped his hands on his stomach, leaning back in his chair. His eyes were inscrutable.
‘So you want to make another journey to London?’
‘Oh, I do, please! I know it’s a tremendous favour to ask, but if you would try to understand how I have felt with no memory of my parents, and now here is an opportunity of getting one.’
‘And supposing you hear something you wouldn’t care to know?’
‘What do you mean? There is nothing like that about my parents. What could there be that I shouldn’t know?’
Uncle Edgar was chuckling gently.
‘Be a little calmer, my dear. If I know anything at all, Mr Craike will tell you you are your mother over again, wilful, turbulent, a proper handful, eh? That’s how he’ll describe you.’ He was patting her hand in his familiar reassuring way. ‘Don’t look so anxious. You shall go to London and see this gentleman. We shall both go.’
‘You mean you will come with me!’
‘I will certainly come with you. Looking as you do at this moment you could certainly not be trusted to travel alone.’
He submitted to Fanny’s impulsive hug with amused tolerance.
‘Perhaps you’ll even have a good word to say for your uncle when we get to London.’
‘But of course, Uncle Edgar. When can we go? Tomorrow?’
‘One day next week, perhaps.’
‘Oh, but, Uncle—’
Uncle Edgar made a sudden impatient movement, as if his goodwill were only superficial. Fanny had a cold feeling that he already regretted his promise.
‘Am I to cancel all my appointments, no matter how important, for a sentimental old man who has already waited almost twenty-one years to see you? Come, my dear, be reasonable.’
‘Yes, of course. It must be at your convenience. I didn’t think.’
‘Never mind thinking.’ He reached in his pocket for his snuff-box. ‘Pretty women shouldn’t think.’ As he opened the box some of the snuff was spilt. How strange. Uncle Edgar’s plump fingers were never clumsy. But he was laughing softly again. ‘And a man should never allow himself to be upset by a pretty woman.’
‘Have I upset you, Uncle Edgar?’ Fanny asked bewilderedly.
‘Yes, you have. The hunting season begins in ten days. I shall have to miss the first meet. The devil take old Craike who should have been in his grave ten years ago.’
Amelia had found the little Chinese camel. She was holding it in her hands when Fanny came into the room. She started guiltily at Fanny’s entrance, and Fanny exclaimed, ‘Amelia, how dare you! Going through my things!’
‘I was only looking for some cotton in your work box. Why did Adam give you this? Did you ask him for it?’
‘Ask him for it!’ Fanny snatched the camel from Amelia in high indignation. ‘No, I did not. He merely saw that I admired it.’
‘And so, as if you were the Queen, he had to give it to you!’ Amelia’s face was flushed, her voice sneering. ‘Why is it that you have to get everything these days, even another trip to London to see a silly old man in his dotage. I don’t know what has come over Papa. But now, all the time, it’s Fanny must do this, Fanny must have that, as if—I don’t know. Why didn’t you marry Mr Barlow and go awa
y?’
‘Amelia!’
‘You needn’t think Adam cares for you just because he’s given you that ugly old camel. To tell the truth, he’s just sorry for you. He told me so.’
‘And why is he sorry for me?’ Fanny asked in a low voice.
‘Good gracious, how could he not be? Everyone’s sorry for poor relations.’
‘I think you’re just being spiteful.’
‘No. I’m speaking the truth. Mamma says it should be me getting the trip to London. It’s time I went to operas and theatres. But I don’t really grudge it to you. You’ll have little enough.’
‘Will I?’ Fanny asked dreamily. The little camel cradled in her hands felt like the whole world.
‘Don’t look like that!’ Amelia cried, stamping her foot. ‘You look lovesick and silly. Adam isn’t going to marry you. He’s going to marry me.’
‘Has he—told you so?’
‘I’m not blind!’ said Amelia and suddenly burst into tears and ran out of the room.
In his own way George made a worse scene than that. He had got it into his head that Fanny was going to meet Hamish Barlow in London. It was useless to tell him that she wasn’t, that Hamish Barlow had long ago sailed for the East, ‘Then who is it you’re going to meet? It must be a man. You wouldn’t look excited like that for a woman.’
‘Yes, it is a man, but a very old man. Nearly ninety. Does that satisfy you?’
‘It would if I believed you,’ said George. His eyes were sulky and smouldering. ‘Are you going to come back?’
‘Of course I’m going to come back!’ Fanny said exasperatedly. ‘Though sometimes, the way you behave, I’d like to stay away.’
‘If you do, I’ll follow you. I’ll follow you and kill you both.’
One day George would do something like that—if he hadn’t done so already. Fanny’s thoughts inevitably went back to Ching Mei and the riddle of that tragic evening. Then he would have to be put away, either in a mental hospital, or behind the grim grey walls of Dartmoor prison. How terrible to ride past the prison and know that Cousin George was there. And yet what a relief it would be. Neither his parents nor his besotted grandmother recognised his potential danger. She had loyally tried not to recognise it herself, but the time was coming when she couldn’t endure his persecution any longer, when something would have to happen.
