Philippa Carr - [Daughters of England 06]

by The Love Child

  Then the impulse came to me to go back and look again, to assure myself that I had not imagined the whole thing. I had worked myself up into a state of intense emotion. I had planned to murder. Had I really seen him lying there? I kept asking myself, or had it been an illusion, a horrible hallucination conjured up by a tortured mind?

  I must go back. I must look again on that dead face. I must make sure that I had really seen what I thought I had.

  My need was to act. I could not stay in this room alone. I must be sure. So I went back to the stables, took my horse and rode once more to Enderby Hall.

  I tethered my horse at the entrance to the drive and started forward. The house loomed before me. It seemed to take on a life of its own—leering, sinister.

  Come inside, it seemed to be saying. Come inside and face your doom.

  I pushed open the door. It was still ajar. I stepped into the hall. How eerie it was with the faint moonlight shining through the windows. There was a terrible silence everywhere. It was as though everything in this house were watching me … waiting.

  Horror crawled over me. I had known as soon as I had first entered this house that evil was lurking in it.

  Run! Run while there is a chance, a voice within me was saying. Don’t look on that sight again.

  But I had to see. I had to assure myself. It had not been a dream. I had seen him lying there. I had seen his elaborate waistcoat stained with blood.

  I went to the foot of the stairs and started up. What a silence there was in that house! The silence of death. My footsteps seemed to make a great deal of noise on the wooden stairs.

  I had reached the balcony. I stared.

  There was nothing there.

  But I had seen him! How long ago? How long had it taken me to get home and back? He had been lying there. I had seen him.

  I would not believe I had imagined him. I had looked on his distorted features. I had seen the blood on his clothes.

  This was getting more and more like a wild nightmare.

  I looked closer. There was a stain on the wooden boards. Blood!

  No, I had not been mistaken. I had seen him lying there and someone had taken him away.

  I turned and fled down the stairs. I came out into the cold night air. I went to my horse and mounted.

  And then I saw it … the flickering light among the trees. Someone was there.

  Who? And what was that person doing?

  I dismounted. I had to know. I tied up my horse again and I went back through the gate. I did not go into the house but towards the shrubbery, and there, hidden by the bushes, I watched that flickering light.

  Someone was there … digging. And I knew that it was a grave which was being dug.

  Whoever it was who had killed Beaumont Granville was burying his body in a grave.

  I was filled with a terrible fear. I leaned against a bush. I must not be seen. I said to myself: Don’t look. You know.

  I stood there and covered my face with my hands.

  I had betrayed my secret. I had kept it for so long because I had always feared what might happen if the events of that terrible night were known. I had feared just this.

  I should never have told.

  I recognized the digger. Of course I recognized him. Did I not know him as well as I knew anyone?

  I saw Leigh’s face clearly in the moonlight and felt an impulse to go to him.

  But something stopped me. No, if the body were carefully buried, if all trace of the murder were removed, it might be that no one would discover that Beaumont Granville had been murdered at Enderby Hall.

  I went back to the house. I mounted and rode away.

  When I reached Eversleigh Court I was in a state of exhaustion. I went to my room and fell onto my bed.

  After a while my mother came in.

  “My dear Priscilla, you look ill,” she said. “What is the matter?”

  “I have a dreadful headache,” I told her. “I just want to be quiet and lie in the dark.”

  “What a pity. It was going to be such a happy homecoming for Leigh. Where is he? I thought you and he were together. I shall have to put dinner back.”

  “I shan’t come down tonight,” I told her. “I feel too ill.”

  “We shall have to have the feasting tomorrow, and if you are not better I shall call the doctor in to see you.”

  “Oh, dear Mother,” I said, “I am so sorry.”

  She kissed me. “It’s nothing, dear child. There is tomorrow. It will be all right then. I’ll leave you now to rest.”

  I lay in the darkness. Then I got up and undressed. I must pretend to be asleep because I could not speak to anybody yet.

  It was nearly two hours later when Leigh came in.

  He came quietly and I pretended to be asleep. He came to the bed, holding a lighted candle and looking down at me. I kept my eyes shut and when he turned away I opened them. I saw his muddied clothes and I felt sick with fear.

  He was a long time washing the mud from himself.

  That night we lay side by side. I had not spoken to him since his return, pretending to be in a deep sleep. He did not seem to want to speak either. We lay side by side through the night, feigning sleep, but I was aware of his wakefulness.

  The Revelation

  LOOKING BACK, I CANNOT think how I lived through the next few weeks. The memory of Beaumont Granville was always with us.

  The next day I had gone out to that spot where I had seen Leigh among the trees. It was clear that the earth had been disturbed and I knew that the body of Beaumont Granville was lying underneath it.

  I was almost beside myself with grief and anxiety. Somehow I had always known that that night which I had spent with him had not been the end. It was only the opening of a hideous tragedy. It was like a macabre masque and this was the inevitable ending.

  The affair at Venice had been the prelude. The attempted abduction and the thrashing had set the stage for what was to come.

  Leigh was a murderer because of what I had done. I had always known that he would kill Beaumont Granville if he learned what had happened. His nature was one of impulsive passion. When he had heard what had happened, he had planned to kill him and he had done so without delay. Then he had dug his grave and buried him.

  Murder is a fearsome thing. I suppose anyone who has committed it can never forget it. I had come near to committing it myself. But should I have fired the fatal shot when I had come face to face with my tormentor? I began to wonder. Instinct told me that I would never have done it. I could never have killed another human being whatever the provocation. But I could almost wish that I had done it myself rather than that Leigh should.

  It had been my tragedy. I had made the decision to save my father’s life. I should have been the one who took that last action.

  But I could never have done it. I realized that now.

  And now what was next? I was sure it was not finished.

  For a whole week nothing happened. Leigh and I were like strangers. We could not even make an attempt at leading a normal married life.

  He seemed as though he did not want to come near me, and yet I was aware that he was yearning for me. I took refuge in illness. It was not difficult.

  My mother sent for the doctor, who said I needed to eat more. I was exhausted. I must rest and eat nourishing food, or I might go into a decline.

  Carlotta came to see me. I believe she had to be persuaded to do so. She was aloof and sullen.

  Harriet came. “What on earth has happened to you?” she demanded. “You are so wan. You haven’t been yourself for a long time. What is it?”

  I repeated what the doctor had said.

  “Carlotta is disturbed,” she said. “She hasn’t heard from our romantic hero for some time.”

  “Oh?” I said faintly.

  “No. Apparently he had been at Enderby and he has just disappeared.”

  “At Enderby!” I said blankly.

  “Yes. The empty house. It’s hers, of course,
and it seems he went there so that he would be near and she could go and see him. Then one day … he’s gone. She thought he had to go to London and didn’t have time to tell her. She’s anxious now to go to London.”

  I said nothing.

  “She’s determined to marry him,” went on Harriet. “I expect she will. Once she’s made up her mind she doesn’t rest until she gets what she wants. You’ll have to get reconciled, Priscilla.”

  I turned my head away listlessly.

  “Well,” said Harriet, “it’s life. If he’s a bit of a rogue she’ll get used to it. The young have to live for themselves, you know. No use trying to set them on the straight and narrow path before they have explored the byways.”

  I wanted to shout at her: Go away. I can’t bear any more.

  Christabel came to see me. She soothed me because she did not talk about Beaumont Granville but herself. She wanted another child. She thought she ought to have one. She knew it was what Thomas wanted more than anything.

  “I thought you were supposed not to,” I said.

  “It would be dangerous, they said. But I think young Thomas needs a brother or sister.”

  “Don’t be silly,” I admonished, “he needs you more.”

  “I suppose so,” she answered. “It was a miracle, wasn’t it, the way I became so important to my two Thomases? … I who had never been important to anyone before and only a nuisance to some.”

  “You always did talk a lot of nonsense about that, Christabel.”

  A few weeks later she came to me and told me she was pregnant.

  “It will all work out for the best,” she said. “I know I am doing the right thing.”

  My mother said it was foolish in view of what had happened at the time of young Thomas’s birth. Thomas Willerby was very worried; but there was an air of serenity about Christabel, and she kept insisting that this would make everything right.

  We all began to believe her.

  And I was glad to listen to talk about the coming baby rather than to let my thoughts dwell perpetually on the terrible thing which had happened.

  There was a strangeness in the house. My father had changed towards me. I often found his gaze fixed on me, and when he saw that I noticed he would smile in an embarrassed way. When he spoke to me his voice was almost tender. He was noticing me at last.

  I wanted to say: It is too late now. Everything is too late. Carlotta is saved … but by what means!

  Leigh and I had fallen into a strange relationship. There had been restraint between us from the first and that had come from me. Now it was stronger. He was uneasy as well as I was.

  My husband was a murderer. It might have been a righteous murder, but it was murder all the same. He had killed Beaumont Granville and had buried him under the ground. We never knew from one day to another when some clue might lead to the discovery of his body. The suspense was unbearable.

  Harriet was our informant.

  “It’s very strange,” she said. “Our Beau seems to have disappeared completely. No one has heard of him in London for months.”

  “Are they trying to find him?” I asked.

  “They think he’s gone abroad. He owed a good deal of money. His creditors are gnashing their teeth. He apparently borrowed a good deal on the strength of his coming marriage.”

  “I daresay,” I replied.

  “Then … he just disappears. People are getting more and more certain that he has gone abroad. He always travelled quite a lot. They are saying that the heiress must have jilted him and he had to get away, as he couldn’t face his creditors.”

  “It seems a possible explanation.”

  “But of course, the heiress didn’t jilt him, as we know full well.”

  “There might have been another reason.”

  “There must have been. Carlotta is heartbroken. She cannot understand it. They were going to London together and there were not going to be any carriage mishaps that time.”

  “And yet he has gone.”

  “I have a theory.”

  “What?” I asked, trying to keep the note of fear out of my voice.

  “He scented an even greater heiress … someone in another country.”

  “That seems a likely explanation.”

  “I put it to Carlotta. It made her furious at first, but I think she is beginning to suspect it might be true.”

  “She rarely comes to see me,” I said sadly.

  “Oh, she blames you for spoiling the romance. I have come to the conclusion that you acted wisely.”

  “Thank you.”

  “He was a little too blatant. Just going off like that without a word! He ought to have stayed and honoured his obligations. At least he should have presented her with a good excuse. I am sure he could have thought of something moderately plausible. But to go like that …”

  “Do you think she is getting over it?”

  “Yes. She is not brooding so much. Benjie is a great help.” She smiled secretly. “They were always such friends … and still are.”

  I closed my eyes.

  “At least she has been saved from disaster,” I said.

  And I thought once more: And at what bitter cost!

  I sometimes went to that spot where on the day after that fearful night I had noticed the disturbed earth. The grass had now grown over it. It was not easy to find.

  No one would think of looking for Beaumont Granville there.

  They had ceased to talk of him now. I wondered if they still did in London. They would shrug their shoulders. He had no close family. They would presume he had gone abroad as he often did. Perhaps years later they would presume him dead and some distant cousin would take over his estates.

  Now the months were passing. Summer had come. I wondered how long Leigh and I could go on in this way.

  I sometimes asked myself whether it would have been easier if I had told him that I knew what had happened, that I had seen the bloodstained body of Beaumont Granville, that I had watched him as he dug his grave. Would it have been better if we had been entirely frank?

  I could not know, but it seemed to me that whatever happened Beaumont Granville would lie between us for the rest of our lives.

  Our marriage should have brought such happiness to us both. We loved each other. There was no doubt of that. I knew I would never love anyone as I loved Leigh and he had committed murder out of his love for me. Yet we were like two people struggling in a mist, wanting to find each other and yet unable to because of the great burden of guilt which lay between us.

  Leigh was my beloved husband, but he was a murderer; and I shared his guilt because that murder had been done because of me. Moreover, how could I be sure that if Leigh had not arrived at Enderby Hall before me, I might have been the one who was guilty of taking a life?

  And so we went on through those hot summer days. There was no peace for either of us. For me the future seemed completely bleak. There was only one matter which made me rejoice.

  Carlotta had been saved.

  We had taken the Dower House. We had acquired the land. On that land was Beaumont Granville’s grave. Leigh had been adamant that we must have that area.

  I thought: We are safe now. No one will ever discover the body. But I would never forget. I wondered whether his ghost would return to haunt us. It was there already. There was no need for strange sounds or weird sights. I believed that he would be there to torment me for as long as I lived. Could we ever be happy again? Oh, yes, he was dead; he was lying there murdered in his grave, but he was still with us.

  November had come—the season of mists and darkness.

  Christabel’s child was born. It was a healthy girl and we were all delighted. Alas, it was as it had been with the other child. She became ill immediately after the birth.

  The doctors shook their heads and said they had warned her. She should never have risked having another child.

  I went to see her. She looked almost radiant. She was very proud of the baby.

&nbs
p; “Thomas has his daughter,” she said. “It is what I wanted for him. He has two lovely children and I have given them to him.”

  I thought: She will get well. She must. She was so contented.

  The day after I had visited her, Thomas came over to the Dower House.

  “Christabel wants to see you urgently,” he said. “She wants you and Leigh, and she says you must come together. You two alone … and now.”

  I said: “She is feeling better. She must be.”

  Thomas said: “She seems very happy. Very much better, yes. I am sure she is going to be well soon. But she did say she wanted to see you two as soon as possible. Will you come back with me?”

  I said we would and went off to find Leigh.

  We went over to Grassland without delay and straight to her room.

  She was lying propped up on pillows and there was a strangeness about her. She looked almost ethereal.

  “Priscilla!” she cried. “Leigh! I am glad you have come. I was afraid you would not get here in time.”

  “Of course we came,” I answered. “But what’s the urgency, Christabel? You are looking better. You look …”

  “Yes, how do I look?”

  “Radiant in a way … You look happy.”

  “I am … in a way … now you’re here. There is something I have to tell you … something important. It’s not easy, but I can’t rest until I tell you. It’s very important. I must begin at the beginning. Then you’ll understand. You know my nature, Priscilla. Envy has ruled my life.”

  “It was because of your birth, Christabel. I understand. But you changed when you married.”

  She nodded. “I was so jealous of you … particularly you … because you were born in the right place.”

  “I know. But there is no need to worry about it anymore.”

  “People should think before they bring children into the world. A short-lived pleasure … and there is a life … someone else’s life. When I thought Edwin might love me I was very happy. Not that I loved him exactly, but I yearned for what marriage with him would have meant. And then we went to Venice and I was in your confidence and I was pleased about that. Priscilla, I was pleased about your trouble …and because of everything that had to be done. I was fond of you. That’s why it is so hard to understand. Yet because of your difficulty I couldn’t help being pleased in a strange way.”