The Secret Woman

by Victoria Holt

  I said quickly, “Captain Stretton was greatly impressed by the Levasseur cabinet.”

  Aunt Charlotte grunted. “It’s a fine piece,” she said. “You’d never regret having it. It would be very easy to place if ever you wanted to pass it on.”

  “I am sure of it,” he said earnestly.

  “Have you seen it in daylight?” Her voice was ironical. She didn’t believe for one moment in this act. To her it was an absurd charade.

  “No. That’s a pleasure in store for me.”

  Aunt Charlotte was staring at the candlestick in his hand.

  “Aunt Charlotte,” I said, “you must be very tired after your journey.”

  “Then I should take my leave,” said Redvers. “And thank you for your kind hospitality.”

  “And the Levasseur?”

  “In daylight,” he said. “As you tell me I should.”

  “Come tomorrow,” she said, “I’ll show it to you myself.”

  He bowed.

  “Ellen will show you out.”

  But I was not having that. I said firmly: “I will.”

  And I went with him to the door. I stood in the garden with him. I was talking wildly about the cabinet. “That marquetry of brass on the tortoiseshell background is really very beautiful. There is no doubt that it is genuine Levasseur…”

  “Oh, no doubt at all,” he said.

  It was autumn and I could smell the peculiar odor of chrysanthemums and the dampness of the ground and the mist on the river. Whenever I smell those smells I remember that night. My enchanted evening was over, and he was going away. I was shut in my prison; he would leave me for his life of adventure and I would go back to my infuriated jailer.

  “I think she is a little put out,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

  “I thought she would be away another night.”

  “I meant I’m sorry I’m going away. I’m leaving you to face that…”

  “I could face it if…”

  He knew what I meant. If he were there to face it with me, if I could see him now and then, even if they were stolen meetings, I would not care. I was twenty-one years of age. I did not have to be Aunt Charlotte’s slave forever.

  “I wish it had been different,” he said, and I wondered what he meant by that. I waited for him to go on, and I knew I could not stay long. Inside the Queen’s House Aunt Charlotte was waiting.

  “Different?” I insisted. “You mean you wish you hadn’t come?”

  “I couldn’t wish that,” he said. “It was a wonderful evening until the ogress returned. She didn’t believe me, you know, about that…thing.”

  “No,” I said, “she didn’t.”

  “I hope it is not going to be…disagreeable.”

  “But the evening before she came was so very agreeable.”

  “You found it so?”

  I could not hide my feelings. “The most agreeable evening I have…” No I must not be so naive. I finished, “That I have spent for a long time.”

  “I shall be back,” he said.

  “When?”

  “Perhaps sooner than you think.”

  He took my face in his hands and looked at me; I thought he was going to kiss me, but he seemed to change his mind and suddenly, he was gone and I was alone in the autumn-scented garden.

  I went back into the house. Aunt Charlotte was not there. Ellen was clearing the table.

  “Your aunt’s gone to bed,” she said. “Mrs. Morton’s helping her. She’s worn out. She says she’ll see you, and me, in the morning. Oh miss—we’re in for it, we really are.”

  I went back to my room. Such a short time ago he had been there with me. He had brought a magical touch to my life and now he was gone. I had been foolish to imagine… What had I imagined? What did a young woman who was not outstandingly attractive have to interest a man who must surely be the most charming in the world?

  And yet…there was something in the manner in which he had looked at me. Had I shown too clearly my feelings?

  I took out the figurehead and set it on the dressing table. Then I undressed and when I got into bed I took the figurehead with me—a foolish childish gesture, but I found it comforting.

  ***

  It was a long time before I could sleep but at last I dozed. I awoke with a start. It was the creak of a floorboard—the sound of a footstep on the stair which had disturbed me. Someone was coming up to the top of the house…footsteps and the tap-tap of Aunt Charlotte’s stick.

  I sat up in bed; I stared at the door which slowly opened and she stood there.

  She looked grotesque in her camel’s-hair dressing gown with the military buttons, her long gray hair in a coarse thick plait, and in her hand the ebony-topped stick which she used since her arthritis made it difficult for her to walk about. She carried a candle—in a plain wooden stick, not one of our valuable ones.

  She glared at me. “You may well look ashamed of yourself,” she said. Her laughter was horrible, sneering and in a way coarse. “I couldn’t sleep for thinking of what happened tonight.”

  “I have done nothing of which to be ashamed.”

  “That’s what you tell me. So you waited until I was out of the way before you brought him in. How often has he been here? You’re not telling me this was the first time.”

  “It was the first time.”

  She laughed again. She was angry and frightened. I didn’t know it then but she needed me far more than I needed her. She was a lonely old woman who had to rely on people like Mrs. Morton; but I was to be her salvation. I was going to look after her and the business; she had trained me for just that. And what she feared was that I would marry and leave her—as Emily Beringer had.

  She looked round the room. “You’re feeling lonely now he’s gone, I daresay. Don’t tell me he wasn’t up here. I saw the light from the garden. You ought to have thought to draw the curtains. But then you weren’t expecting to be seen, were you? You thought you had the place all to yourself and that Ellen, she was in it, too. A nice example to her, I must say.”

  “Ellen was not to blame.”

  “She served your supper on the Delft, didn’t she?”

  “That was foolish but…”

  “But not so foolish as bringing him up here to your bedroom.”

  “Aunt Charlotte!”

  “Don’t play the innocent with me. I know you were up here. I saw the light. Look. There’s candle grease on the dressing table. Didn’t I see you come down together? Oh, I wonder you can lie there, so brazen. You’re another such as your mother, you are. I said at the time it was a pity your father ever took up with her.”

  I said: “Be silent, you wicked old woman.”

  “That sort of talk will get you nowhere.”

  “I won’t stay here,” I said.

  It was the worst thing I could have said.

  She turned her rage on me. “You ungrateful girl! I did everything for you. What would have happened to you if I hadn’t taken you in, eh? It would have been an orphanage, I can tell you. There was nothing, nothing left for you. I kept you. I’ve tried to make you useful. I’ve taught you all you know…to give you a chance of paying me back and this is what you do. Bring strange men into the house as soon as my back’s turned. Your mother all over again… I shouldn’t wonder.”

  “How dare you say such things. My mother was good, better than you could ever be. And I…”

  “And you are good, too? Oh, very good. Very good to young men who visit you when my back’s turned.”

  “Stop it! Stop it!”

  “You dare to order me in my house.”

  “I’ll go if you like.”

  “Where to?”

  “I’ll find some post. I know something about antiques.”

  “Which I have taught you.”

  “I could be a
governess or a companion.”

  She laughed. “Oh yes, you’re very clever. I know. Has it occurred to you that you might owe me something? You might think about that. A fine fool you are. Making yourself cheap to the first man who comes along. And from that place too. I should have thought you would have known better where someone of that reputation is concerned.”

  “What reputation?”

  She chuckled. “You ought to select with more care. I can tell you that Captain Redvers Stretton has not a very good name in this town. He’s the sort who’s going to take his fun where he finds it. And I’ll daresay that he’s ready to try all sorts.”

  I could only cry: “Go away. I don’t want to hear what you have to say. I’ll leave here. If you want to get rid of me, if I’m such a burden…”

  “You’re a rash and foolish girl,” she said. “You need me to look after you. Your father was my brother and I’ve got my duty. I’ll have a good talk to you in the morning. I’m worn out and my pain is terrible. I couldn’t sleep for thinking about you. I thought I’d speak to you tonight. But tomorrow perhaps you’ll be in a more contrite mood.”

  She turned and went out. I stared at the door. I was hurt and angry; the evening had changed. She had smirched it with her evil thoughts and her talk of his reputation. What did she mean by that? What did she know?

  And then suddenly there was a piercing scream and the heavy thud of something falling. I got out of bed and ran to the stairs.

  Aunt Charlotte was lying at the foot of that flight, groaning.

  I ran down. “Aunt Charlotte,” I said. “Are you hurt?”

  She did not answer; she was breathing heavily.

  I called Mrs. Morton and Ellen. Foolishly I tried to lift my aunt; I couldn’t, so I found a cushion and put it under her head.

  Mrs. Morton came hurrying. With her fine hair in curlers under a net she looked different, grim, excited.

  “My aunt must have slipped coming down the stairs,” I said. I remembered warning Redvers.

  “At this time of night,” said Mrs. Morton. She picked up the candle which Aunt Charlotte had dropped. There was the faintest moonlight shining through the window. Aunt Charlotte began to groan again.

  I said: “Put on your cloak, Ellen, and go and ask Dr. Elgin to come.”

  Ellen ran off and Mrs. Morton and I stayed with Aunt Charlotte.

  “How did it happen?” asked Mrs. Morton. She looked rather pleased, I thought, and I imagined what it had been like traveling with Aunt Charlotte.

  “She came to my room to talk to me and fell on the way back to her own.”

  “She was in a rage, I daresay,” said Mrs. Morton.

  She looked at me obliquely; I realized that I had never understood Mrs. Morton at all. She seemed to be shut in with some secret life of her own. I wondered why she endured Aunt Charlotte’s tantrums. Surely she could have found more congenial employment elsewhere? I could think of no reason for her staying but that of Ellen: that she would be remembered in my aunt’s will if she were still in her employ.

  It seemed a long time before Ellen returned. Dr. Elgin would be with us shortly, she said.

  When he came he said we should get Aunt Charlotte to bed at once. I was to make hot sweet tea for her because she was suffering from shock. He thought she had been lucky for no bones were broken.

  As I made the tea, Ellen said: “What a night this has been! Do you know, I reckon this could knock years off her life. A fall like that, at her age…”

  And I know that she was thinking of taking her legacy to Mr. Orfey.

  ***

  Life changed after that. It was the beginning of the disastrous period. Aunt Charlotte had injured her spine in the fall and this had aggravated her arthritis. There were days when she could not walk except to potter about the house and sometimes she could not even do that. She could not always go to sales; I had to go. I became a well known figure at them. At first I was treated with mild contempt; but this so angered me that I determined not to miss anything and I became more and more knowledgeable, so that they had to respect me. “She’s her aunt all over again,” it was said. And I was rather pleased because the only way in which I could bear to resemble Aunt Charlotte was in her knowledge.

  More than anything Aunt Charlotte had changed. I made excuses for her in the beginning. A woman with her energetic mind must find it tragic to be physically incapacitated. It was small wonder that she was irritable and bad tempered; she had never been convivial but now she seemed to hate us all. Continually she reminded me that I was responsible for her condition. It was her concern for me that had made her come to my bedroom; it was because she was so upset by my conduct that she had carelessly walked into the edge of that table and tripped. I had cost her her health and vigor; I owed it to her to repay her in any way I could.

  The household had never been gay; it now became grim and melancholy. She would sit propped up in her chair in her sitting room on her good days and go through the accounts. She never allowed me to see them; she herself did most of the buying. She would allow me no authority although my knowledge was growing and was not far behind her own.

  I began to experience once more that feeling that the Queen’s House was a prison; and just as in the old days I had dreamed of reunion with my mother as my means of escape, now I thought of that evening with Redvers and I told myself: He will come home from his voyage and when he does he will come to see me.

  The months passed and I heard nothing of him. The autumn was with us—the smell of dahlias and chrysanthemums in the garden; the damp mist was rising from the river and it was the anniversary of that evening and still I heard no news of him.

  Aunt Charlotte was getting more crippled, more irritable. Scarcely a day passed during which she did not remind me where my duty lay.

  I went on waiting and hoping that one day Redvers would seek me out, but he never did.

  It was Ellen who brought news to me. Her sister still worked for the Creditons. She had married the butler and had come up in the world. Lady Crediton was pleased with her and although she was not exactly a housekeeper, she was in charge of the maids which, being the butler’s wife, was very convenient.

  Ellen said to me one day when she was helping me to take some Ferrybridge pottery from one of the cabinets and pack it for a customer: “Miss Anna, I’ve been wondering whether to speak to you since yesterday morning.”

  I looked at her in some alarm; she was clearly distressed and I wondered whether Mr. Orfey had grown tired of waiting for her legacy and turned to someone else.

  “I went up to the Castle yesterday to see our Edith.”

  I avoided looking at her; I must handle the pottery very carefully. “Yes,” I said.

  “There’s news of the Captain.”

  “The Captain,” I repeated foolishly.

  “Captain Stretton. Something awful’s happened.”

  “Not…dead?”

  “Oh no, no…but some awful disgrace or something. He lost his ship.”

  “You mean it was…sunk.”

  “Something like that. They’re all talking about it up at the Castle. It’s something dreadful. And he’s miles away. And it’s some disgrace, but there’s something else, Miss Anna.”

  “What, Ellen?”

  “He’s married. He’s been married some time. He’s got a wife in foreign parts. He must have been married when he came here that night. Who’d have thought it!”

  I didn’t believe it. He would have said so. But why should he discuss his private affairs? I must have misunderstood bitterly. I had thought… What had I thought? I was a simpleton. I was all Aunt Charlotte said I was. That evening had meant nothing to him. Two people could see the same event entirely differently. He had called on me because he had nothing else to do before he sailed. Perhaps he knew how I felt about him and was amused. Perhaps he had told his wife
about that last evening. The meal by candlelight, the arrival of Aunt Charlotte. I suppose it could be seen as comic.

  “How interesting,” I said.

  “I had no idea, had you, miss?”

  “Of what?”

  “That he was married of course. He kept it dark. There’s trouble about that, too. Whoops! You nearly dropped that. There would have been trouble if that had been broken.”

  Broken, I thought dramatically, like my dreams, like my hopes. Because I had been hoping. I had really believed that one day he would come back to me and then I would begin to be happy.

  Captain Redvers Stretton was married. I heard it from several sources. He had married somewhere abroad, married a foreigner, so they said. He had been married for some time.

  When Aunt Charlotte heard, which she did inevitably, she laughed as I had rarely seen her laugh before. And from that day she taunted me. She never lost an opportunity of bringing his name into the conversation. “Your Captain Stretton. Your evening visitor. So he had a wife all the time? Did he tell you that?”

  “Why should he?” I asked. “People who come to look at the furniture don’t feel it necessary to acquaint one with their family history, do they?”

  “Perhaps people who come to look at Levasseurs might.” She laughed. She was better tempered than she had been for a long time, but spiteful and malicious.

  He came home I believe but I didn’t see him. I heard from Ellen that he was there. And the time passed—one day very like another, spring, summer, autumn, winter; and nothing to make one week different from another except perhaps that we sold one of the Chinese pieces which nobody seemed to want, for what Aunt Charlotte called an excellent price but which I believed was what she had paid for it. She was relieved to see it go. “You wouldn’t find another like that,” she said. “Carved red lacquer. Fifteenth century of the Hsüan Te period.”

  “And you wouldn’t find another buyer either,” I retaliated.

  We were like that together, constantly bickering; I was getting old and sour and so was everyone in that house. Ellen had lost some of her exuberance. Mr. Orfey was still waiting. Poor Ellen, he wanted the legacy she would get more than he wanted her. Mrs. Morton was more withdrawn than ever; she went off on her free days once a fortnight and we never knew where she went. She was mysterious and secretive in her ways. I was twenty-five—no longer young. Sometimes I thought: It is four years since that night. And it meant nothing to him because all the time he was married and he didn’t tell me. He implied… But had he implied or had I imagined it? Aunt Charlotte never forgot. She was constantly reminding me that I had behaved like a fool. I had been an innocent and he had known it. It seemed amusing to her; she would titter in an infuriating way when she spoke of it. It was the only subject she ever found amusing.