“I don’t know why you find it so funny,” said Verity in a voice that trembled as if she was about to cry.
“My apologies, dear sister-in-law and cousin.”
“Why don’t you address Verity by her name?” said Edwina. “It would save time and be less irritating.”
“There are lots of Veritys in this world, but for me only one sister-in-law and cousin, that’s why. I’m sorry about the laughing. Of course you’re right to concern yourself with Charlotte’s virtue, dear cousin. Just where did Cormac kiss Charlotte, presuming your eyesight is good enough to give an accurate account?”
“My eyesight is perfect, thank you. It was in the classroom.”
“I mean on what part of her person did he kiss her?”
“On the top of her head, no mistake.”
There was an explosion that was a cross between a sneeze and a splutter, followed by coughing.
“Ring for a servant, Vee, to clean up that mess.”
“Stay where you are,” said Waldron with difficulty. “They can do it later.”
“Perhaps you could desist from drinking until we’ve finished this discussion. Red wine obviously doesn’t do your reasoning or the table any good.”
Waldron’s voice was back under control. “There’s nothing wrong with my reasoning. It’s not my drinking causing the trouble, it’s your sister’s witticisms.”
There was the scrape of a chair. “I know when I’m being made a fool of,” said Verity with tears in her voice.
“Sit down, Vee, and behave yourself, Waldron,” Edwina snapped. “Though I can’t really see why we’re bothering to talk at all seeing there’s no way we can come to any agreement. I think Mr Delaney should go, Waldron thinks he should stay. I think the paintings should be removed, Waldron thinks they should stay.”
“I’m not looking for agreement,” said Waldron. “And why are you speaking to your sister as if I’m not in the room? I’m commanding you – Cormac Delaney stays and the paintings stay. I forbid you to go back to the salon to badger and hector that poor man who is only doing his job.”
Charlotte could hear him taking big gulps of liquid. She couldn’t imagine the expression on her mother’s face, as she’d never heard her spoken to in that way before.
“Why can’t you let the poor girl experience a bit of joy? Don’t bother answering. I’ll answer for you. Because you’re jealous of her, that’s why. You can never resist a dig. You’ve always been jealous of her.”
Edwina snorted. “That’s preposterous. What’s there to be jealous of?”
“Her riding ability for one. Bertie couldn’t praise her highly enough, and everyone who saw her at the hunt was amazed by her horsemanship. All this talk of superiority and a trade – it’s all balderdash – silly arguments to cover up your jealousy. And you never pass the chance to make snide comments about her every time her name comes up in conversation. Just remember that if it wasn’t for you she’d still be at the Park riding Mandrake as happy as the day is long.”
Charlotte’s heart somersaulted.
“Let’s clarify this.” Edwina’s tone was slow and menacing. Charlotte shivered to hear it. “Are you saying I’m to blame for my accident?”
“Well, of course I am. That’s exactly what I’m saying.”
“I don’t believe I’m hearing correctly. It was Charlotte who jumped in front of me and knocked Mandrake’s legs from under him.”
“She was only nine, for God’s sake, and who instructed her to ride that treacherous, pig-headed, half-mad mongrel of a horse with no mouth when she had a perfectly safe one of her own?”
“Half-mad mongrel? How dare you? I trained Sandstorm myself.”
“Exactly. Ruined him, more like.”
“So that’s it. Now it’s all coming out. Showing yourself in your true colours. Admit it. It was you who was always jealous. Of me and my horsemanship.”
“Jealous of you? There’s a laugh. When did you ever hear yourself described as a good rider?”
“I’ve had plenty of compliments.”
“Yes, I’ve heard them. Fearless, tough, strong, but never good. Any word except good.”
Verity contributed. “She’s been told she rides as well as a man.”
“What man?” Waldron scoffed. “The mad major who sits on a horse like a sack of potatoes? Or Marcheson, who wears out his mounts before they turn eight? Or Partridge, who crippled his prize filly? Not me, anyway. No, it was you, jealous of Charlotte. Why else put her on an unmanageable mount and then blame her for not being able to manage him? Don’t interrupt. I haven’t finished. Charlotte has a rare ability that you don’t have, and because of you it’s wasted. Wasted. There was no need for her or Harcourt to be relocated here. It’s not as if you ever see them. They should have stayed at the Park. It’s their birthright. Charles always said he would love to have them. It was spite that made you do it. Nothing but spite.”
“Now I’ve heard everything!” Edwina screeched. “The next thing you’ll blame me for is Victoria’s disappearance!”
“Now that you mention it. Let’s put it this way – if you were in the army you’d be court-martialled. It happened on your watch. Nothing you can say can alter that. Your watch. Responsible.”
“You’ve gone too far. Vee, would you mind? I can’t stay here another minute. We would have all been a lot better off if you’d stayed in India. We’ve managed perfectly well without you over the years. Come on, Vee.”
“Managed perfectly well? Looks like it. Harcourt is still only a child and he’s all right so far,” Waldron slurred. “Give it time. You’ll think of something.”
The door banged and the women were in the passageway. “Drunken loud-mouth. Twisted liar. If he thinks he can tell me what to do he’s got another think coming,” said Edwina, loading each syllable with venom. “Charlotte, Charlotte, always Charlotte!”
“He might be a lord, but he’s not your master, Edwina. There’s a higher authority than his so you don’t have . . .”
Charlotte strained to hear more but the swish of the wheels of the chair obscured the fading voices.
So it wasn’t my fault? Could that possibly be true? Her father had said the most beautiful words she’d ever hoped to hear and he sounded as if he knew what he was talking about.
Until she was twelve she’d believed Nurse Dixon had caused Mandrake’s accident by screaming the curse, ‘Mandrake will die,’ but after Charlotte outgrew her fascination with fairy stories and accepted with sadness that they were all make-believe, she had to conclude that curses fell into the same category as the stories and had no power, just as Miss East and Cormac had repeatedly told her. So if it wasn’t the curse, she had to accept it was her poor horsemanship that had caused the clash. Until she heard her father’s pronouncement through the wall tonight, the conviction that it was all her fault hadn’t wavered during those years.
There was a thud and sounds of shattering glass next door and then more sounds of fumbling and smashing.
She heard the sound of footsteps entering the dining room and recognised the voices of two male servants.
“There now, easy does it, sir,” said one. “Just put your arm around my shoulder.”
“There we go, sir,” said the other.
Wishing to avoid what would obviously be slow progress, Charlotte slipped out of the dark room, silently closed the door, and disappeared around the corner. She could see herself staying awake all night – so much to think about and so much to tell Cormac in the morning when he returned from his night of celebration. He would be pleased to hear how her father had stood up to her mother over the matter of exhibiting. About Mandrake she would say nothing.
39
It was five o’clock in the afternoon when Cormac arrived back from his revels to find Charlotte waiting for him in the classroom.
“She did it, my little colleague,” he said. “She did it. Can’t call you ‘apprentice’ any more after last night. She did it. Blast her, anyway. Sorry.
”
“She?”
“Your mother. Afraid so. Paintings gone. Wait till I sit down and I’ll tell you the story, then I need to go to bed for a long time.”
According to David Slane, Edwina and Verity were waiting at the door at opening time. Edwina insisted the paintings be removed as her daughter was underage and had not been given permission to participate. A few other members of the Society tried to talk her out of the decision, saying if only she knew what a sensation the paintings caused she would be bringing more in, not taking them down. They said not being an artist herself she couldn’t appreciate how difficult it was to sell one piece, let alone four, especially if you weren’t an established name and not regarded as an investment as yet. Charlotte was the talk of the town already, showing such talent at a young age, and when word spread there would be a lot of people turning up to see them and leaving disappointed. Did she have any idea that the Society was considering offering her daughter full membership at the next meeting – the youngest member ever – and what an honour it was?
“No luck, then?” said Charlotte.
“Not a bit. The more they argued the more intransigent she became. But David had to stand firm in not declaring the sale null and void – said it was out of his hands. That collector won’t be able to believe his luck. David said in the end it was the wheelchair that won the day – you can’t argue with a person with a disability — and he gave in about taking the paintings down. But he was upset. Now he has to face people who weren’t lucky enough to be at the opening pouring in to get a look at this artist’s work, and all they’ll see is a blank space. He’s going to have to make up some story to placate them but it won’t be easy and he’s not looking forward to it. Your four masterpieces are hidden away in the back of his office where they’ll have to stay for three weeks until the exhibition is officially over and the owner’s agent can come and collect them. That’s how the system works. David begged me to try to get your mother to change her mind.”
“No chance of that,” said Charlotte, relating what she’d heard in her hideout the night before.
“You’ll have to try to look at it in a positive light seeing as you have no choice. In a strange way she might have done you a favour. The city will be buzzing with the story by the end of the week and the demand for your pictures will grow out of all proportion. To capitalise on it, you can work hard and build up your stock and then when you come of age you can burst back into the limelight and your mother won’t be able to do a thing about it.”
“But that’s five years away.”
“It will pass quickly.” He leaned over and put his good hand on her head as if to bless her. “Promise me you won’t fritter your life away in trivia like most of your lot. Promise me you’ll use those years to experiment. Try new approaches.”
“I don’t have to promise,” Charlotte said.
“Of course you don’t. I know I can count on you. Good girl.” He removed his hand and stretched as he yawned. “Now I really must go and pass out. Great night – pity you were too young to join us.”
“Just as well, actually. I heard last night that Aunt Verity thinks your ways are too informal with me and you’re not her idea of a schoolmaster.” That was the most innocuous way she could rephrase Verity’s accusations.
Cormac laughed with genuine delight. “Does she now? And she’d be an expert, would she? You’ll have to enlighten her that I never claimed to be a teacher. A soldier who took orders from his superior, that’s all I was.” He gave her a mock military salute. “But we did all right, didn’t we?”
“Better than all right,” Charlotte smiled.
“So there you are, then. Congratulations on last night. You were great, so you were. Now go and tell your Aunt Verity I’ll hardly be seeing you at all over the next six months as I’m expecting your father to be a hard taskmaster, so she can relax.” He stood up and took a few seconds to steady himself. “And after that I won’t be seeing you at all, unless you come to see me in my bohemian area of Paris. Now that would give your aunt something to pray about.”
40
During the six months while Waldron was resisting any attempts by Cormac to change his rigid ideas about art, Charlotte painted conscientiously. Cormac dropped by every afternoon to follow her progress and tell her how terrific she was. “You’re on your own now,” he told her. “There’s nothing more I can teach you. When I come back to check on you in a few years’ time, I expect to be even more dazzled by your singular vision than I already am.”
After Cormac finally left the townhouse for Paris Charlotte was gripped by a sudden and terrible loneliness. Deprived of his exuberance and support, she slid into a state of inertia. Her old sense of worthlessness returned as if it had never left. Week by week, the walls of the safe Dublin world that Cormac had created around her began to crumble and fall and she felt as if she was trapped in a basement, cut off from all sources of light. The speed of her loss filled her with the same sense of helplessness and fear she had felt as a child when Nurse Dixon was in authority over her.
Along with the desolation there was a perverse sense of comfort in reverting to a state that was familiar to her. She had lived in a dark basement for a long time in the past and was now returning to it. It was as simple as that. Cormac’s good opinion of her that had buoyed her up for six years had been fuelled by his own optimistic outlook and bore no relation to what she knew to be her own lack of value.
Victoria, her face contorted with pain, appeared in a dream, holding out her hands in an appeal for help. Charlotte tried to run to save her but her legs wouldn’t function, and she could only look on while Nurse Dixon seized Victoria and slammed her against the nursery wall to punish her for being such a cry-baby. Charlotte woke, disorientated with sick disgust at not being able to protect her little sister.
After staying hidden for so long, Charlotte asked, why have you chosen to show yourself now, Victoria, when I haven’t the strength to help you?
Charlotte stood in front of a finished painting and was suffused with a hatred for it and for all her work. Cormac had told her not to waste her life on trivia, but what could be more trivial than this useless object when one compared it to the actuality of a lost sister? Daubs of colour on a canvas, arranged this way and that and then framed and hung on a wall, achieving nothing. Decoration. Nothing but decoration. How could she take herself seriously? Two of her favourite brushes lay on the easel ledge, hardened by paint she had forgotten to rinse out with turpentine and she didn’t care. All those various shades of grey were pathetic in their lifelessness. She took up a tube of vermilion, squeezed it on to the canvas and spread it around with the palm of her hand, but felt no release of frustration.
If she didn’t get a stretch of sleep soon she would become ill, if she wasn’t already ill. Victoria’s supplicating hands hovered on the borders of consciousness, not even waiting until Charlotte had sunk into a deep slumber before reaching out to ask for help.
“I’ll make a deal with you, Victoria,” Charlotte wept, sitting upright in her chair, trying to avoid sleep to escape her nightmares, her neck sore from snapping each time she nodded off. “It won’t make up for the past, but it’s the only thing I can think of to try to make amends.”
She would not dedicate her life to art, as she had promised Cormac. Instead she would take her year in the Paris finishing school seriously, so that she would emerge polished and ladylike, ready to marry the first man who asked her. She would have a baby immediately, and she would dedicate her life to it and make sure it never came to any harm, looking after it herself with no nanny to help, not following the aristocrats’ tradition of using boarding schools to gain social advantage, and sending it to day school instead so she could study its face at the end of each day and discern if there was anything troubling it, and if there were she would find out what it was and would fix it. That was her objective – to replace Victoria with a child, preferably a daughter, who would, due to unstinting vigilance, surv
ive fearless and happy into adulthood.
Victoria must have accepted the deal as she didn’t intrude on Charlotte’s dreams again for years.
41
Sydney
1925
Two years after the Waratah was refurbished, Norma Rossiter, encouraged by her husband, had thought she’d better start a family before she ran out of time – no point in working all the hours God sent to build an empire if there were no little Rossiters to inherit. Mrs Sinclair had then left the Waratah to help her daughter in the house, confident that Elizabeth Dixon, now Head Receptionist and Head Bookkeeper, had learnt everything she could teach her.
In a rival bank, a block away from the one Mrs Sinclair introduced her to, where she lodged the hotel’s daily takings, Dixon had opened a second account under the name of ‘Beth Hall’ to avoid confusion.
The Rossiters had gone on to have three children during which time Dixon received thirty-six proposals of marriage: ten from drunks, seven from octogenarian widowers, five from married men whose wives didn’t understand them, six from lonely men who recanted the following day, six from simpletons and two from underage boys. A desirable eligible man near her age with all his parts intact was such a rarity she hadn’t seen one, and even if she had she wouldn’t have accepted him because he wouldn’t be able to hold a candle to her memory of the divine Manus.
Her dislike of other people’s children was reinforced every first Sunday of the month when she visited the Rossiters and was repulsed by their brats who grew worse as they grew older, hanging on to their mother, making demands and interrupting the conversation. If she could have them on her own for a week she’d be able to straighten them out. It was all she could do to restrain herself from leaning over to give them a good slap when their mother wasn’t looking. They even pestered Mrs Sinclair while Norma, red-faced and breathless, being made a fool of by the middle one, was tending to their needs in the kitchen. Mrs Sinclair was as bad as her daughter in spoiling them, wearing herself out when she wasn’t really up to it any more. It was obvious her health was failing but the children didn’t take account of that. Why didn’t they pay someone to look after the brats? It wasn’t as if they were short of money.
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