by Rosie Thomas
The days played tricks on her now.
Clio could not remember what she had already told the girl and what was still mute memory. She was afraid that she was repeating herself, the stories that she knew to be innocent, in an attempt to suppress what must not be told.
The secrets grew harder to keep with the passage of time.
The dark twin was always with her, the sin she had committed. A sudden longing to confess it swept up inside her, breaking through the careful silence of the decades that seemed no longer as imperative as the truth.
Clio thought that the girl with her long, loose hair looked like Ophelia in a pre-Raphaelite painting. The thoughts crossed and tangled in her mind.
She said loudly, ‘Nymph, in thy orisons Be all my sins remembered.’
That was exactly right. Her sin must be remembered, and this long-haired nymph with her recording machine had been sent to her for the purpose of hearing her confession.
‘What was that?’ Elizabeth asked.
The stupid girl probably didn’t know her Shakespeare at all. What had the line been? Clio realized that she had forgotten it already, and it was so very important.
‘What was I saying?’ She shook her head in bewilderment.
‘Don’t worry. It will come back. There’s plenty of time.’
Elizabeth felt less calm than she sounded. The truth was that she did not have plenty of time. She must finish the book soon.
She knew objectively that she shouldn’t spend any more time with Clio. She had already told her everything she remembered about her cousin from more than fifty years ago.
And yet, something still drew her back to Little Venice, to sit under the terrible portrait. Clio had been closer to Grace than anyone, and she had been deeply shocked by her death. There was probably nothing there, but Elizabeth was still waiting for some extra insight into Grace’s life. Some story, perhaps, that she had not heard before.
She repeated. ‘There’s plenty of time.’ And she was thinking, Just give me something, Clio. Just one little extra spark will help me to get the bloody book finished, and I’ll put you in it too.
Clio said, more to herself than to Cressida’s daughter, ‘I don’t think so.’
The child was mistaken. There was not much time.
She stirred in her chair. ‘I want to talk about the flood. Are you listening to me?’
As calmly as she could, Elizabeth told her, ‘I know all about the flood, Aunt Clio. Grace’s drowning is very well documented. There are contemporary news reports, diaries, letters. They all describe what happened, and I have read everything there is. It must have been dreadful.’
‘I didn’t write any diary,’ Clio said.
‘No.’
‘And I am the only person who knows what really happened.’
‘What did happen, Aunt Clio?’
Clio took a great breath. She tried to look round, over her own shoulder, to see the portrait for the last time. But the back of her chair was too high, and she found that she was too weak to crane sideways.
‘I killed Grace.’
Elizabeth’s eyes flicked to the door, in search of the day nurse. Clio was wandering again. She was also prone to making wild claims, Elizabeth had learnt that. It was as if she was afraid that her own story was not quite interesting enough; perhaps she had sensed all along that no one would really want to write or read her biography.
Elizabeth reddened guiltily, and leant forward to flick the stop button. Gently she said, ‘But Grace was caught in a flood, when the sea-wall gave way. She was swept away, no one could have saved her.’
Clio only repeated, ‘I killed her. I wouldn’t open the door to her. I wanted her to die.’
Her bright eyes had clouded. She stared straight ahead of her, into vacancy.
Elizabeth insisted, ‘No, Aunt Clio, she was swept away. She didn’t reach the door, did she? You felt guilty because you were saved and she was dead, isn’t that it? Grace was your friend, almost your twin. But you couldn’t have done anything to save her. You mustn’t believe it could have been any different. You never said anything about this before, did you? Your memory is playing tricks on you.’
Clio sank back in her chair, and closed her eyes.
‘I am tired now.’
All my sins, she thought.
Hamlet, that was it. ‘All my sins remembered.’
She did remember. She had forgotten so much else, but never that. She had kept the secret of Grace and the flood, and that in itself had been a sin. There had been times when she had longed to tell the truth, to people she had loved and to others, strangers caught with her in the fleeting intimacy of ships and aeroplanes and hotels, but she had kept her secret. The necessity of keeping it had been a great burden, and the solitary shouldering of it had been part of her punishment.
Now the secret was told. Clio was weary and her body ached, but she felt better. Lighter, and stronger, like a girl again, as if a weight had floated away from her.
Elizabeth nodded and began to pack away her tape-recorder and her notebook. There was nothing else to learn; she must tell the story that she already knew. When she was ready to leave she hesitated, looking down at the shrunken face.
Clio opened her eyes. ‘What were we just talking about?’
Elizabeth smiled at her. ‘The old things,’ she answered.
She left Clio to doze in her chair, and went away to tell the nurse that she would let herself out.
When the front door had closed on the brief rattle of street noise the nurse came briskly through the quiet house. She bent over Clio in the chair, and then put her warm hand over her patient’s tiny clawed one.
‘Come along, Mrs Wolf, dear,’ she said. ‘It’s time for your rest.’
Clio nodded, smiling a little, ready to sleep.
Look out for Rosie Thomas’s next novel, Daughter of the House
London 1919
Born in to a theatrical background, Nancy Wix is not a woman to be held back by family or class. At a young age she discovered clairvoyant abilities that would change her whole life – from a boating accident that leaves three strangers dead, to visions of the Great War to come, Nancy strives to change her fate. When she meets an enigmatic and handsome young man, an opportunity arises to escape the life she seems destined to lead – but can she rely on a man who leads a double life, or must she look inside herself to break free?
Coming July 2015
Click here to pre-order now 9780007512072
London 1885
As a turbulent and change-filled century draws to a close, there has never been a better time to alter your fortune. But for a beautiful young woman of limited means, Eliza’s choices appear to lie between the stifling domesticity of marriage or a downwards spiral to the streets – no matter how determined she is to forge her own path.
One night at a run-down theatre, she meets the charismatic Devil Wix – showman, master of illusion, fickle friend. Drawn into his circle, Eliza becomes the catalyst of change for his colleagues – a dwarf, an eccentric engineer and an artist – as well as Devil himself. And as Eliza embarks on a dangerous adventure, she must decide which path to choose, and how far she should go when she holds all their lives in her hands.
Click here to buy now 9780007512034
Within one exotic land lie the secrets of a lifetime …
Newlywed Nerys Watkins leaves rural Wales for the first time to accompany her husband on a missionary posting to India. Deep in the exquisite heart of Kashmir lies the lakeside city of Srinagar, where the British live on carved wooden houseboats and dance, flirt and gossip as if there is no war.
But the battles draw closer, and life in Srinagar becomes less frivolous when the men are sent away to fight. Nerys is caught up in a dangerous friendship, and by the time she is reunited with her husband, the innocent Welsh bride has become a different woman.
Years later, when Mair Ellis clears out her father’s house, she finds an exquisite antique shawl, a lock of chi
ld’s hair wrapped within its folds. Tracing her grandparents’ roots back to Kashmir, Mair embarks on a quest that will change her life forever.
Click here to buy now 9780007449996
About the Author
Rosie Thomas is the author of a number of celebrated novels, including the bestselling The Kashmir Shawl. A keen adventurer, she has climbed in the Alps and the Himalayas, competed in the Peking to Paris car rally, trekked in the footsteps of Shackleton in South Georgia, and travelled in Ladakh and Kashmir. She lives in London.
Rosie can be found on Facebook at www.facebook.com/RosieThomasAuthor where she’d love to hear from you.
Also by Rosie Thomas
Celebration
Follies
Sunrise
The White Dove
Strangers
Bad Girls, Good Women
A Woman of Our Times
All My Sins Remembered
Other People’s Marriages
A Simple Life
Every Woman Knows a Secret
Moon Island
White
The Potter’s House
If My Father Loved Me
Sun At Midnight
Iris and Ruby
Constance
Lovers and Newcomers
The Kashmir Shawl
The Illusionists
Coming soon
Daughter of the House
About the Publisher
Australia
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Canada
HarperCollins Canada
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New Zealand
HarperCollins Publishers (New Zealand) Limited
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http://www.harpercollins.co.nz
United Kingdom
HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.
1 London Bridge Street
London, SE1 9GF
http://www.harpercollins.co.uk
United States
HarperCollins Publishers Inc.
195 Broadway
New York, NY 10007
http://www.harpercollins.com
