The Goddess and the Gaiety Girl

by Barbara Cartland

  “And help me to forget – please God – help me to learn to live without him so that the pain that I feel now will lessen – and I shall only be grateful for having once known the love that is part of You – ”

  The coffin was being lowered slowly into the ground and she opened her eyes.

  On the other side of the grave she saw a man standing and as she looked at him, she thought with a sudden constriction of her heart, that she must have been dreaming.

  It was the Duke.

  *

  The Duke was in his study when his comptroller, Mr. Arran, came into the room.

  “Jackson is here, Your Grace.”

  The Duke rose from his desk.

  “Show him in, Arran,” he said. “I want to hear why he has been so long.”

  “I am sure he has a reasonable explanation to give Your Grace,” Mr. Arran replied, with just a note of rebuke in his voice.

  He was, in fact, extremely grateful that the detective he had employed on the Duke’s orders had at last answered his summons to come to Tregaron House as soon as he had anything to report.

  Ever since the Duke had arrived in London he had enquired a dozen times a day as to whether the detective had any news for him, and he was obviously extremely annoyed when the reply was not what he desired.

  In fact, Mr. Arran was finding it very difficult to understand why the Duke was in such an obvious state of agitation over a Gaiety Girl who purported to have been married secretly to the late Duke.

  He had known the 4th Duke and worked for him for over fifteen years, and he did not believe for a moment that he would, however ardently he desired a son, have married one of the women he desired for a very different reason.

  Debauched, depraved and taking for his companions some of the vilest creatures in London, he had nevertheless always been extremely conscious of his own importance and, in his own way, proud of his family history.

  In fact Mr. Arran was astonished that the new Duke believed for a moment that the tale of a marriage, even with the evidence of a Certificate was true. He was almost sure that the letter, although it certainly appeared to be in the Duke’s handwriting, was a forgery.

  He was well aware, however, that to substantiate his convictions they needed proof, and he had been waiting for the detective and his findings almost as eagerly as the Duke had.

  Now with an undoubted note of triumph in his voice he announced,

  “Mr. Jackson, Your Grace!”

  The detective walked into the room.

  He was a small, rather ferrety-looking man and, the Duke thought, exactly what he might have expected a private detective to look like.

  “Good morning, Your Grace.”

  “Good morning,” the Duke replied, “I hope, Mr. Jackson, you have something to tell me. I have been waiting for your report ever since I arrived in London.”

  “I know that, Your Grace, but it’s not been at all easy to get the information you required.”

  “But you have it now?”

  “Yes, Your Grace.”

  The Duke, with an expression of relief on his face, sat down at his desk and indicated a chair at the side of it. The detective seated himself and drew from his pocket a number of carefully written notes.

  “On Mr. Arran’s instructions, Your Grace,” he began, “I went to the Gaiety Theatre and ascertained that Miss Katie King had performed in all the shows put on by Mr. Hollingshead over the last six years.”

  He paused to note that the Duke was listening intently, and continued,

  “Before that she appeared at the Olympia Music Hall and had come to London when she was just seventeen, from Stockport.”

  “I know all this,” the Duke said.

  “I’m glad that what I’ve discovered confirms what Your Grace has been told.”

  Mr. Jackson turned over a page and went on,

  “Miss King had a small part in every show which became a popular item with the audience in that her hair, which I understand was a very attractive colour, fell down during her dance. They waited for it to happen and applauded when it did.”

  “Go on,” the Duke urged. “I want to know where she is now.”

  “I’m coming to that, Your Grace. In the last year Miss King has moved several times from one lodging to another, but lately she had a room in Lambeth.”

  “What is the address?”

  “Quay Street, Your Grace, number ninety-two, but it’s not, if I may say so, a particularly salubrious neighbourhood.”

  “She is there now?”

  “No, Your Grace. Apparently some six to seven weeks ago Miss King left the Gaiety. She was not well.”

  The Duke moved a little restlessly as if he was aware of this.

  “She stayed at home at ninety-two Quay Street with a man who has been with her for the last four years.”

  “Man? What man?”

  Mr. Jackson turned over a page of his notebook.

  “His name’s Harry Carrington, Your Grace, and he’s well known in the Theatre World as a ‘hanger on’ of actresses or dancers who are making a fair amount of money from their ‘profession’.”

  The way Mr. Jackson spoke insinuated a number of extensions of the word ‘profession’.

  “Apparently,” he continued, “Harry Carrington had been unusually faithful in staying with Katie King for far longer than is expected in such liaisons.”

  To his surprise the Duke rose from the chair in which he was sitting to move to the window to stand staring out. Still he did not speak, and after a moment of indecision Mr. Jackson went on,

  “I learned from the other people in the house that a doctor came frequently to visit Miss King. Then at the beginning of last week she went away.”

  He paused but there was no response from the Duke and he said, with a touch of pride in his voice,

  “It wasn’t easy for me to discover where she had gone, but eventually I followed Harry Carrington who continued to sleep in the room they had shared in Quay Street. He led me to a house in Harley Street.”

  “Harley Street?” the Duke said sharply. “What number?”

  “49, Your Grace. It’s the house and Nursing Home that belongs to a well known Surgeon by the name of Sheldon Curtis.”

  “And she is there now?”

  “No, Your Grace. Miss King died three days ago!”

  Mr. Jackson spoke again with that little note of triumph at his own cleverness and also with an awareness of the almost sensational finale to his tale.

  To his surprise he saw that the Duke was glaring at him as if he could not believe what he had heard. Then he said in a voice that was aggressively hoarse,

  “Did you say Miss King has – died?”

  “Yes, Your Grace.”

  “I do not believe you!”

  “But it’s true, Your Grace, and she is, in fact, being buried this morning. There’s no doubt about that. Mr. Curtis told me so himself.”

  The Duke turned to stare once again out of the window.

  Mr. Jackson waited, thinking the silence was very oppressive, until the Duke asked,

  “Where is she being buried?”

  “In the churchyard of the Parish Church of Lambeth, Your Grace. St. Mary’s. I think the funeral’s at noon.”

  Again there was silence.

  Then, without speaking, without even looking at the detective, the Duke walked swiftly from the room.

  The grave-diggers were shovelling earth onto the coffin and Larentia could only stand feeling as if the Duke’s eyes on the other side of the grave held her captive, and it was impossible for her to move or even breathe.

  The Parson said the last words of the service and as he turned to walk back towards the Church the girls from the Gaiety moved to Harry’s side to start talking to him. Larentia did not even hear them.

  She was conscious of nothing but the Duke and she knew as he walked round the grave to her side, that her will had gone and she only knew that inevitably fate had caught up with her and there was no appeal
against it.

  Without speaking he put his hand over her arm and drew her away from the grave and back past the broken tombstones down the path to the lych-gate to where his carriage was waiting outside.

  He helped her into it and only as the footman placed a rug over their knees did he ask,

  “Where do you live?”

  For a moment it was impossible for her to reply. Then in a voice that trembled Larentia answered,

  “20 Wellington Road – it is the house on the corner.”

  The footman shut the door and a moment later the carriage drove off.

  Larentia’s heart was beating tumultuously and her voice seemed to have died in her throat. It was impossible for her even to look at the Duke or wonder what he was thinking.

  She clasped her fingers in her black gloves together to stare straight ahead, thinking only that he was there, he was beside her and it was a wonder beyond words, even though he knew that she was a liar and a cheat.

  ‘I cannot even give him his money back,’ she thought despairingly, and wondered if he would understand when she told him why she had needed it.

  The carriage came to a standstill outside her home and still feeling as if her willpower had gone and she was a puppet with the Duke pulling the strings, Larentia stepped out and fumbled in her bag for the key.

  The Duke took it from her and opened the door.

  As they went into the small hall and across it into the sitting room Larentia wondered what he must think of her surroundings after having seen her against the background of the Castle, and the beauty of it which would always be to her the mysticism of Camelot.

  As she reached the centre of the room she turned to face him.

  Then as her eyes met his, the spell that had held them silent was broken and the words came tumbling to her lips.

  “ F – forgive me – please – forgive me,” she pleaded. “I did not mean to deceive you in the way I did. I – s – swear to you I did not know that – Katie King was not married – to your uncle as I was – told she was.”

  She drew in her breath before she went on,

  “I – needed the m – money desperately to save both my father and Miss King from dying of c – cancer, but I truly believed she really had been – married secretly to the Duke, and it seemed at the time that nothing mattered except that she and – my father should live – ”

  Tears had come to her eyes as she spoke, and it was difficult to see the expression on the Duke’s face, but she felt it must be one of condemnation.

  Then he asked quietly,

  “What is your name?”

  “Larentia Braintree – my – my father writes books on Mediaeval History, especially the Arthurian legends – which is why I know so much about them.”

  “Are you telling me that your father is Professor Braintree who wrote The Truth About King Arthur and translated the Welsh poem: Y Gododdin?”

  “Yes. You have heard of him?”

  “Of course I have heard of him!” the Duke replied. “I have every book he has ever written in the library at the Castle, if you had asked to see them.

  Larentia drew in her breath.

  “Perhaps then you will understand why I – behaved as I did,” she said. “Papa was – dying and the doctor said the only chance there was of saving him was if he could be operated on by Mr. Sheldon Curtis, and it would cost – two hundred pounds!”

  She made a helpless little gesture with her hands.

  “It was – impossible to find so much money and when Mr. Carrington – ”

  “What is that man to you?” the Duke interrupted sharply.

  “Katie King was attended by the same doctor who looked after Papa. Mr. Carrington came to see me with the suggestion that because she had been married to your uncle we could obtain money for both her and Papa to be operated on by Mr. Sheldon Curtis.”

  “That meant you needed £400,” the Duke said. “Why did you insist on £800?”

  “The money had to be borrowed from a Usurer called Isaac Levy and he demanded 100% interest!”

  Somehow Larentia thought this made her whole behaviour seem even more degrading than it was already.

  “I am – sorry,” she said again.

  Now she could not prevent the tears from overflowing from her eyes and running down her cheeks.

  “So the operations took place while you were at the Castle,” the Duke said, as if he was reasoning it out for himself, “but Katie King died.”

  “Mr. Curtis said she was in a much worse – condition than Papa.”

  “Your father will recover?”

  “Completely! He is coming home in ten days.”

  “In the meantime you are living here alone?”

  “I – I am all right.”

  “Have you thought about the Castle since you ran away from me?”

  “Y – yes – of course I have!”

  It was difficult to say the words and she knew he was waiting for an answer.

  “Is that all?”

  “All?”

  “Have you not thought about me?”

  She felt him come nearer to her as he spoke, and now because there was a note in his voice that had been there the night he had kissed her, she said a little incoherently,

  “Forgive me – please forgive me. I know what I did was – wicked, but Papa is alive and perhaps you can understand how much that matters to me?”

  “That is not what I asked you,” the Duke insisted.

  She felt herself tremble because his voice seemed to vibrate through her and she said quickly,

  “I have thought about you – of course I have – and I felt perhaps you would be – angry when I disappeared – I did not mean you ever to see me again – so there was nothing else I could do.”

  “Why not?”

  Now there was a silence that seemed to Larentia to be full of meaning.

  She did not want to answer, but knew the Duke was waiting and in a voice he could hardly hear, she whispered,

  “Because – I could not do what you asked. It would have been – wrong and would have spoilt our – love.”

  “Our love?” he enquired. “So you did love me!”

  “Of course I – loved you!” she replied a little wildly. “I loved you from the first moment when I thought you came to me in silver shining armour – and when you kissed me, I knew that I had seen and touched – the Holy Grail.”

  Her voice died away.

  Then she whispered,

  “But I could not allow you to soil what was – sacred and part of God – or allow you to be part of what would be a – sin.”

  “So you were thinking of me!”

  “I shall always think of you,” Larentia said, “but you belong to Camelot and you must go back there and do everything that is fine, noble and great – because that is what is expected of you.”

  She paused, then said, as if she could not help herself,

  “But please think of me – just sometimes – when you are alone.”

  “Do you really think that would be enough?” the Duke asked. “Do you believe I could be content with only thoughts of you, Larentia?”

  ““There is nothing else I can give you,” she whispered and her voice broke on the words.

  She thought the Duke would turn and leave her.

  But when it was an agony to stand with tears running down her face waiting to hear him go, he put his hands on her shoulders and turned her round to face him.

  She made a little murmur of protest, and then instinctively she looked up into his eyes and was lost.

  All she could see was the expression on his face, which to her was the embodiment of everything that was fine and noble in the legends of the Knights of the Round Table.

  She felt the Duke’s fingers through the thin material of her gown and she was aware of the closeness of him and how strong and overpowering he was.

  Then he asked, and she thought there was a hint of laughter in his voice,

  “Are you really
trying to send me away, Larentia? How could you do such a thing when you know that neither of us could be complete without the other?”

  “You have to – go,” she replied. “There is nothing else we can do as I have tried to make you understand.”

  “I do understand,” the Duke said, “but I am not asking you, my precious, to do anything that is secret or wrong. I was crazy to think that was possible in the first place. I am asking if you will marry me, and together we will make the Castle the Camelot it was always meant to be.”

  For a moment Larentia felt as if she could not have heard him right, and must have dreamt what he was saying.

  Then as she looked at him, her eyes shining through her tears and her lips trembling because she was both afraid and excited at the same time, he pulled her against him and his mouth came down on hers.

  It was so wonderful, so rapturous after her belief that she had lost him and would never know such ecstasy again, that she wished for a moment that she could die.

  Then as his kiss became more demanding, more insistent, she wanted to live.

  The wonder he had evoked in her before swept over them both, and Larentia felt as if once again he carried her up to the very throne of God, and they were neither of them human, but divine –

  Only very much later, it might have been a few minutes or a century of time, the Duke raised his head and she said incoherently,

  “I – I love you – did you really say that I could stay with you and love you – or did I dream it?”

  “We are both dreaming,” the Duke answered in his deep voice. “I have thought and dreamt of you since I first saw your picture and now I can hardly believe that the goddess I have worshipped all my life is here in my arms.”

  He drew her beside him and kissed her again fiercely and demandingly then said with what sounded like a note of anger in his voice,

  “How could you leave me? How could you go away in that cruel manner? You have driven me nearly crazy these past few days and when I was told you were dead, the world came to an end!”

  “I am – sorry,” Larentia said again. “Please, please forgive me – and show me how I can make it up to you.”

  “You can only do that by loving me.”

  “I do love you! I love you until it has been an agony for me to be alone in this house – with only thoughts of you to haunt me.”