by Parks, Adele
Lydia needed to be frank, so instead of accepting the posturing cover-up Sir Peter was offering, she pursued the truth of the issue, the truth of Ava.
‘Ava is always extremely careful about that sort of thing. She doesn’t take risks.’
Colour flooded into Sir Peter’s face. Whether it was a blush of embarrassment or the stain of rage, Lydia couldn’t be sure. However, it was clear that he was prepared to be frank when he muttered, ‘Quite. Quite,’ and took a large gulp of whisky, practically draining the glass.
‘You say she’s especially impressive.’
‘Yes.’
‘I’d say she’s a brilliant woman.’ Sir Peter nodded. ‘What are your plans for her?’
‘My plans for her?’ He laughed, seemingly amused by the suggestion. ‘Lydia dear, you’re her best friend. You know her better than anyone; what makes you think I have any ability – or right, come to that – to plan for her?’
‘But someone must.’
‘I’ve never thought so.’
Lydia put her glass down on the silver coaster on the gleaming polished table. Looking directly at him she said, ‘You may have heard rumours that she was close to Lord Harrington.’ She knew that he’d understand the word ‘close’. Sir Peter had heard whispers, though no one had dared to explicitly mention the intrigue to his face. He was a formidable and inestimably wealthy man; his sort rarely heard bad news directly, so few had the guts to deliver it.
‘Are they still close?’
‘No, she tired of him.’
‘I wonder when she will be attracted to a single man. When she will settle down.’
‘That’s just it, I don’t think she will.’
‘Are you trying to tell me …’ Sir Peter seemed at once astonished and horrified. His cheeks puffed in and out in panic; he looked like a fish that had inadvertently jumped out of its bowl and was gasping for air and life. For a moment he considered the possibility that Lydia was trying to tell him that she and his daughter were close; as open-minded as he’d always been, he would not be able to view that as anything other than unnatural. Lydia understood his concern and smiled to herself.
‘No, not that. It’s just the thing with Lord Harrington ended rather badly.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘He beat her.’ Lydia wished there was another way to deliver this news. So bleak and wrong. The father’s face rushed through a variety of emotions: shock, disbelief, outrage, impotence. He leapt out of his chair. Lydia placed a restraining hand upon his arm and wordlessly signalled for him to sit back down, remain calm, not create a scene. Sir Peter fell back into the chair, his body rigid with anger.
‘When? When did this happen?’
‘Two weeks ago.’
‘That’s why we haven’t seen her.’ He shook his head from side to side as though juggling the inconceivable thought.
‘I only found out a week after it happened. She wasn’t going to tell me. You know how private she is.’
‘How is she, exactly?’
‘Mending, but I think it was quite vicious. There’s bruising and cuts. She gets headaches.’
‘I shall kill him. The bastard. Tear him limb from limb.’ Sir Peter’s face was scarlet with outrage. ‘I’m sorry,’ he spluttered. It was clear to Lydia that he was apologising for his language but not the sentiment.
‘Quite. I understand. Although obviously that can’t happen,’ she said smoothly.
‘It bloody well can and it will.’ His hands trembled with rage.
‘No.’
‘Then we must go to the police.’
‘Ava won’t hear of it.’
‘Sod the scandal. He has to be held accountable.’
Lydia felt an intense warmth and admiration for this man; a father who was careless about the gossip and disgrace, but crazy about his daughter and concerned that justice was sought. ‘Really, there is nothing to be done that way. Ava won’t have it.’
‘Well I’m sorry, young lady, but I don’t agree. I thought Ava was interested in the women’s movement. I thought she wanted to help those who suffer domestic violence and abuse from brutes.’
‘She does, absolutely.’
‘By pretending that it hasn’t happened to her? Impossible. Ridiculous.’ His anger spluttered out in all directions, like a faulty firework; he jumped and sizzled and blistered.
Lydia was beginning to think that she had, after all, made a mistake in coming to Sir Peter. She had not accounted for his unpredictability or his determination and urgency to do the right thing. He reminded her of Ava. She ought to have known he would be a wild and strong beast, his own man and difficult to handle. She took a deep breath and tried to regain some control. ‘Her love affairs are her own business. I think you have to accept that. She’s twenty-eight.’
‘But why does she get involved with such men? Such monsters?’
‘I think she is bored. Directionless. So many of us are.’ Lydia had only just understood this much about herself and now she was looking around her with fresh eyes and recognising that she wasn’t alone. There were armies of women, different but the same; single, married and widowed women, adolescent and elderly women stumbling around looking for purpose and reason. They were trying to understand the world they lived in. A world run and brutalised by men.
‘But she has her charities and her causes. They keep her busy.’
‘Her contributions are unstructured and therefore unsatisfactory.’
Sir Peter seemed startled. Was he even listening to her? Or had she lost him to plots of revenge and retribution? Lydia clambered to bring him back.
‘I just came here to ask you one question, Sir Peter.’
‘What was that?’
‘If Ava had been a boy, what would she be doing now?’
‘Assuming she’d survived the fighting? I’d have her by my side in my factories and boardrooms. I’d be planning an early retirement, happy knowing that the companies were safe in such hands. Like you said, she has a brilliant brain and she’s ruthless. She’d make an astounding businessman.’
Lydia smiled, relieved, and sat back in her seat.
‘Wouldn’t she, Sir Peter? Wouldn’t she just?’
48
LAWRENCE WAS FINDING it difficult to concentrate on exactly what the groundsman had to say about fencing the borders. He hoped he didn’t appear rude. There was nothing as churlish as disinterest and he should know. His mind kept running back to Lydia and the conversation they’d had this morning. It was satisfactory. He hoped, perhaps, that things were on the mend.
Lawrence had been pleasantly surprised when she’d arrived back from Sarah’s two days before he’d expected. He thought he’d take the opportunity to involve her in his plans for the estate. He’d practically had to demand her presence; it was almost as though she was avoiding him. Last night she’d requested a tray in her room and refused to come down to dinner; she’d said the heat made her queasy. Whilst he couldn’t very well call her a liar, he did doubt her. He’d all but had to march her into his office this morning. He’d sat her down and explained what had to be sold off in an effort to pay the death duties, and what they might be able to retain. He’d been disappointed when she hadn’t made much of an effort to even pretend to be concerned. Instead she’d smiled, vacantly, politely, and repeatedly said, ‘Do as you think best, Lawrence. I’m certain you know more about it than I do.’
He did, naturally, but still her unresponsiveness frustrated him. For months now she had been like quicksilver: fast, shiny and flowing. He couldn’t get near her. She seemed somehow threatening, even dangerous, and he couldn’t exactly explain why he thought this; it was more of an unquantifiable feeling. Lawrence didn’t generally get muddled up with hunches and such. He liked the direction of his life to be ordered via information, analysis and logical determined study. He resented her for dragging him into the quagmire of irrational thought.
He knew that the only sensible way forward was to clear the air. There had bee
n so much toing and froing of late. They were losing sight of one another. It was becoming messy. The way he saw it, there was only one way to reinstate order. He must address the issue that he knew was troubling her. So he took the bull by the horns.
‘I know what you think, Lydia.’
‘Do you?’ Lydia was sitting on the leather chesterfield sofa in his office. She was wearing pink, which struck him as peculiar, since she’d made such a fuss about buying appropriate mourning clothes. Perhaps she’d decided that she didn’t appear as fetching in black after all; she certainly was a picture in pink. She looked like a flower: silken, dewy. As he looked at her – staring resolutely out of the window, or at the bookshelves, anywhere other than at him and his towering pile of papers – he felt livid that whilst she was his wife, and by the word of God and the law of the land she belonged to him, he had a feeling that she did not. Not at all.
‘Yes, I do,’ he stated confidently. ‘I admit that working as a civil servant during the Great War meant that I escaped the worst of the physical adversity.’
‘Hah.’ The sound erupted, spiteful and honest. Finally she turned to him; he almost wished she hadn’t. Wondrous disbelief dissolved into dry contempt; it was obvious she thought that what he’d said was a gross understatement. Lawrence did not allow her glare to put him off his stride.
‘But I still suffered. I lost my brother, friends and contemporaries.’
‘Yes, I know you did.’ She softened. Encouraged, he pushed on. ‘And now it appears that I may lose you.’ Lydia had gasped. A short, nervous intake of breath. He didn’t want to appear dramatic. It wasn’t an appropriate way for a gentleman to conduct himself, so he clarified what he meant exactly. ‘Or at least the respect you owe me.’
‘I wasn’t aware I was in your debt.’
‘I am due certain things, Lydia, as your husband. Respect is most definitely one of them.’
She’d shot him a look that he wished he did not understand. It was horribly clear. She pitied him. Her expression made him smart. He knew this was much worse than when she had been disappointed in him, or even ashamed of him. She sighed. This disagreement was making them both so weary.
‘Do you know, Lawrence, after all I’ve heard of the war recently, I’m glad you weren’t there. I really am. Your parents were right to keep you out.’
‘I’m still not comfortable with your suggestion that I was out of the war, Lydia. I served.’
‘No, you didn’t, but that’s fine.’
Lawrence had begun to wonder whether it was sensible to pursue the matter any further. What did she know about the war after all? He took a deep breath. This business was tedious. He chose to close off the matter. He didn’t quite understand how or why, but it seemed as though she’d had some sort of change of heart. He was grateful for the first hint that she was reconciled to their situation, after so many months of resisting it. Now they could move on again. They were going to be all right. That was what she was saying.
Lawrence turned to the groundsman and gave him one hundred per cent of his attention, just as he deserved. Onwards and upwards. Order was the name of the game. It must be reinstated. The fields were scorched, but this was England. The seasons would change, the rain would fall, and it would once again become a green and pleasant land. Lawrence felt a sense of clarity and security flow through his body. Sticking to the correct path was paramount. Rules were rules. Method was vital.
It never crossed his mind that Lydia was absolutely not saying that they were going to be all right. Lydia was leaving. She was simply glad that she was leaving Lawrence. Glad that he hadn’t died. It was as charitable as she could be.
49
LYDIA TOOK A cab from Claridge’s directly to Edgar’s lodgings. She instructed the cabbie to drive right up to the door. She had never been so bold before. Her fingers rattled with nervous excitement. On the rare occasions she had taken a cab to his place, she’d taken the precaution of being dropped off around the corner and then sneaking up to the house, only knocking when she was sure the landlady was out. Today, in her excitement, she could barely wait for the cab to slow to a stop before she opened the door. She remembered a similar moment, when Lawrence’s chauffeur had dropped her off outside the V&A museum all those months ago, and she’d scrambled up the steps desperate and terrified about meeting Edgar. Now, there was no fear. Now, she was free. She had made a decision; bold and unpopular, but inevitable. She was no longer Lawrence’s. She would divorce him and become Mrs Trent. She was carrying Edgar’s baby and they’d be a family. She would not skulk or hide herself for a moment longer.
She knocked firmly on the door; she noticed a flake of peeling paint fall softly to the pavement. She paused and then knocked again, louder this time. Children with dirty faces and bare chests clustered around; some were intrigued by the taxi, fascinated by her clothes, others looked bored and apathetic. The same look that their fathers wore when they clustered jobless on street corners. The heat had not let up this summer and shone down ferociously on her stockinged legs. Beads of sweat the size of pinheads were appearing on her forehead.
Lydia listened carefully. She detected movement as the landlady approached the door and, finally, opened it. Lydia had seen parts of the landlady in the past: her backside waddling towards the kitchen as Lydia nipped upstairs; her head decorated with a headscarf through the balustrade as Lydia sneaked downstairs; an arm, a leg. Despite only having these disembodied snatches, she had mentally drawn quite a detailed picture of how she imagined the woman to look. She was gratified to see how accurate a conjecture she’d made. The landlady was fat and dressed in a blue checked nylon housecoat; she had the sort of face that told the world she was difficult to impress or please, and held no truck whatsoever with trying to impress or please others.
‘Yes.’
‘Good afternoon, I’m here to see Sergeant Major Trent.’
‘Are you now?’ The woman folded her arms under her vast bosoms. Lydia thought of maids plumping the cushions in the drawing room.
‘Yes.’ Lydia was too well brought up to barge past the woman; a lifetime of strict social etiquette did not allow her to charge up the stairs to his attic room as she would have liked, even though she had just left her husband to be with him. She breathed shallowly, impatient with herself. With the world.
‘He’s not in.’
‘Then I shall wait for him.’
‘That’ll be a long wait.’
‘When are you expecting him?’ Lydia tried to summon her best smile, but she was finding negotiating with a woman in a housecoat, whilst standing on the street, embarrassing. The children’s slack-jawed gazes were disconcerting.
‘I’m not expecting him.’
Lydia checked her watch. He would be here soon, no doubt. He’d never made her wait, and in the telegram she’d said she’d be here by two. He’d probably popped out to buy some flowers or cake. ‘Perhaps I could wait in the front room.’
The landlady suddenly appeared sly and amused. She held the door open and said, ‘If you like.’
Lydia perched on the edge of the sludge-green synthetically covered armchair. The room was a tight, unsuccessful space that had aimed at smug respectability and landed somewhere near undesirable pretension. The furniture was solid, but unfashionably wooden and austere. There was too much of it for the small room. There was an enormous sideboard that housed a vast collection of small, ugly ceramic ornaments in the shapes of various wild animals; Lydia could not imagine anyone loving them. There were two armchairs and a wooden table in between. The table was too high for comfort; it was scattered with home-made crocheted mats and dominated by a poorly embroidered runner. A second table doubled up as a cocktail cabinet. None of the bottles were decanted. Lydia noticed that the labels on both the gin and the whisky wore ink marks to indicate how much remained, a mean-spirited attempt to deter guests from helping themselves. Everything was covered in a thin coat of dust and appeared a little sticky. There were no pictures on the walls or
chimneypiece. The whole place smelt of mothballs. The landlady did not offer a cup of tea or even a drink of water.
Lydia wondered whether Edgar often sat in this room. She couldn’t imagine it. He was so much more than a man to Lydia. He was a mass, a presence. A geography. A class. Although she had never seen him in his home environment, he was inextricably linked to the mysterious north. When she thought of him, she was reminded of a childhood holiday to the Pennine mountains, the range that formed the backbone of England. At the time Lydia had been somewhat afraid of the bleak, narrow, unknown, chilly, hilly land that was trapped between one churning grey sea and another – the sort of land that Edgar came from – but she’d also been excited by it. Edgar somehow encompassed and exuded the region’s wild, battling spirit of adventure, drama and desire. Maybe it was because he’d been prepared to fight for the land that he seemed to be intrinsically linked to it. He was earthy, virile. In her mind Lawrence was not attached to the land; even though he held the deeds to large chunks of the south, being rich and prosperous and self-serving did not entitle. Whilst the accepted definition of power and prestige lay with Lawrence, and Edgar was considered harsh, uncouth and even dangerous, she could only think of him as he was: uncompromising and brave.
Lydia’s breasts felt heavy; she almost put her hand on her stomach, but she felt the landlady’s eyes trail her and she worried that the woman might understand the gesture. She wished she could take a nap.
She focused on the clock on the mantelpiece. Not long now.
50
SARAH HAD NOT known what to make of the telephone call. When Dickenson had rung, she’d assumed it was to relay a message from Lydia about some or other social arrangement, but there was something about the maid’s tone that alerted her to a problem.
‘Ma’am, would it be too much to ask for you to come over here?’ Dickenson had asked warily.
‘Is Lydia unwell?’
‘No.’
