The Hostage Heart

by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

  “God, you’re so lucky!” she said at last. “How can you possibly envy me? It’s me who should envy you!”

  “How can you say that?” he asked, the light in his eyes fading a little. “What can you envy about my life?”

  She felt this was going a little far. “Come,” she said crisply, “you’ve had every advantage money could buy.”

  “Oh, money,” he said. “Yes, I had that.”

  “It’s all very well sneering at it,” she said, feeling a little cross. “You can afford to say money doesn’t matter as long as you’ve got enough of it. Privilege is easy to belittle when you’ve got it.”

  “Yes, I am privileged,” he said. “But you’ve had a different sort of privilege, and one that I’d have been happy to swap mine for. But I don’t suppose you’d believe me if I told you so.”

  “No, not for a minute,” she said. She tried to say it lightly, teasingly, but he didn’t smile.

  “At least you can be sure that when people say they like you, it’s you they like,” he said in a low voice, almost too low for her to hear.

  “What do you mean by that?” she asked.

  “Oh, nothing,” Gavin said, and he sounded quite depressed.

  The change seemed to start then. The animation left his face, and he said nothing more. Emma, looking at his non-committal profile, wondered whether he was thinking of Zara’s girl-friends throwing themselves at him. We should all have his problems! she thought. She couldn’t help feeling that being spoilt for choice was better than having Hobson’s choice, and that the anxieties of having too much money must be easier to bear than those which came with having too little.

  The rest of the journey was accomplished in almost complete silence. Emma would have liked to chat, but somehow she couldn’t find the right words to begin. When she did broach a subject, he answered her too briefly to get the conversation going again, and after a few such snubs she gave up. His aloofness, or grimness, whichever it was, seemed to intensify the nearer they got to Long Hempdon. What a Jekyll and Hyde character he was turning out to be, she thought to herself. Was it the proximity to home that affected him so adversely, or was it her? He had been so relaxed and easy at the flat, but now after a period alone with her, he had gone back to his usual withdrawn and chilly manner.

  Oh well, whatever the cause, she told herself with a shake, it hardly mattered. Her duties were with the little girl, Poppy, and she didn’t particularly have to get on with Poppy’s big brother. She would be unlikely to see much of him, spending most of her time in the schoolroom and nursery; and in any case, hadn’t he said that he was away a lot? No, Mr Gavin Akroyd was not likely to have much effect on her day-to-day life – and that was probably just as well, she thought, glancing briefly at that icy, uncommunicative profile.

  Chapter Seven

  It was one of those glorious early summer days in May, and the soft air coming in through the open window of the day-nursery (now the schoolroom) was sweet with the scents of grass and flowers. It was hard to concentrate on lessons, even for Emma, so she could hardly blame Poppy for fidgeting and staring out of the window when she should have had her mind on arithmetic. Both pairs of eyes seemed to be inexorably drawn to the brightness outside every few minutes. They usually took a break at half past ten, but at a few minutes past the hour Emma decided to bow to the inevitable.

  “I think we’ll take our break now – what do you think?” she said, closing the book. “Shall we stop or go on? It’s a bit early, but—”

  Poppy shut her own book smartly and beamed with relief. “Oh yes! Break, please.”

  “Perhaps we can take our elevenses outside. It’s such a lovely day. Have you got another favourite spot you’d like to show me?”

  As far as possible, Emma had been letting Poppy show her round the house and grounds, a small act of empowerment that she felt the little girl badly needed. In the time she had been here, Emma had discovered a great deal she didn’t like very much about Poppy’s situation. The Akroyd family was what she had learned at teacher-training college to call dysfunctional; the members seemed to perform their own separate orbits, entirely detached from each other, never intersecting. Mr Akroyd was away a good deal, and when he was at home was usually shut up in his study haranguing someone on the telephone. When he was with his family, his temper seemed on a very short fuse, and when he went away again, Emma couldn’t help feeling relieved.

  Lady Susan led an even more mysterious life, in the sense that Emma had no idea what she did with herself all day. Sometimes she went out in the car, driven by Atkins, shopping, or to visit friends; less frequently a friend visited her for lunch or tea. When Emma met her about the house, she drifted past without looking at her. She didn’t seem to interest herself in Poppy at all, and certainly never came near the schoolroom. Perhaps she didn’t care for so many stairs, Emma thought to herself with grim humour.

  Gavin she found very difficult to fathom. She didn’t have much to do with him, and when she came upon him unexpectedly in the house, he was usually cool and aloof, merely nodding to her or greeting her formally. At dinner he rarely spoke; but just once or twice, in the drawing-room after dinner, when his father had been called away to the telephone, Zara was out about her own amusements, and Mrs Henderson was occupied with keeping Lady Susan from the tedium of her own company, Gavin had seated himself beside Emma and engaged her in conversation. And it had been pleasant, stimulating, and had given her a glimpse of a hidden person she felt she would have liked to get to know better. But it never lasted long. The next time she saw him he would be distant with her again, as though trying to backtrack on any advance in intimacy she might presume upon. She always felt that he was very aware of her status as an employee in the house, and kept her at arm’s length because of it. He would talk to her for as long as it amused him, and then drop her. That was the way, she supposed, he was with women. After Chris, it didn’t surprise her.

  And yet he interested her. He seemed so much the odd one out of the family; and Poppy spoke of him with such wistful affection. If Poppy liked him, Emma thought, he couldn’t be all bad. And she was aware that, little as they had to do with each other, there was something about her that interested him. Often she would catch him looking at her, during those silent dinners; his gaze would be hastily withdrawn as soon as she looked up. But she couldn’t flatter herself it was the interest of approval; a fascination of loathing was just as likely.

  She had made the brief acquaintance of the twins Harry and Jack in their short time at home between their Easter skiing holiday and their return to school. They were tall, handsome boys with cut-glass accents; beautifully dressed, and with beautiful manners and more self-possession than seemed natural in fourteen-year-olds. All the other boys of that age Emma had ever known were at their most awkward, by turns shy and surly, childish and aggressive; greasy, spotty, violently untidy, strangers to the bathroom and unable to carry on a normal conversation with anyone but their own compadres. Harry and Jack were so unlike this template Emma found it hard to believe they were human.

  The difference their presence made to their mother was the greatest revelation to Emma. For a few short days, Lady Susan became animated. She beamed, she attended, she asked questions and listened to the answers. She evidently doted on the boys, and if they were not dancing attendance on her she pursued them to their haunts, forever wanting to touch them, and seeming riveted by their slightest utterance. The boys took this in good part, but in the opportunities she had to observe them she could not see that they felt any great affection for their parent in return. They bore with her because they were too polite not to, but they were glad to get away from her.

  They were polite to Emma, too, with that delightful courtesy of well-brought-up children towards those they hold in utter indifference. They lived only for each other, and had elevated the skills of escaping to be alone together into an art-form. Emma felt very sorry for Poppy, who was even more eclipsed by their sudden glamour; and could
not help noticing how differently Lady Susan behaved towards them as opposed to Poppy. Emma supposed she was one of those women who only cared for their sons and thought their daughters nothing. Poppy would have liked to be with the twins, join their conversations and go with them on their jaunts; but they would not have her. They were kind to her in an off-hand way, but they did not want her company.

  When the boys went back to school, Zara did too, for her last term. Emma was glad to have her out of the house, since she was invariably rude and contemptuous and had many small ways of making Emma’s life uncomfortable. Emma wondered how she would manage when Zara came back for good: there was no prospect of her going to university, it seemed, and in fact her present school was of the finishing rather than the academic variety. She supposed Zara would be launched into society and lead the same kind of life as her mother. Emma hoped she would be able to inculcate some harder ambition in Poppy’s breast than being a clothes-horse and getting married. She could only assume that was what she had been hired for, though she sometimes wondered whether it wasn’t just to keep the child out of her mother’s way.

  At the very least, though, she could give Poppy someone of her own to pay attention to her and offer her affection. The isolation in which the child had led most of her life so far seemed terrifying to Emma.

  Now, in answer to Emma’s question, Poppy said eagerly, “Can we go down to the kitchen? Mrs Grainger said she was making Chelsea buns this morning and they’d be ready for elevenses.”

  “Did she indeed? I love buns.”

  “Me too! They’re the best!” Poppy said eagerly, relief flooding her face that she was not to be denied the treat.

  “She won’t mind our going down there?”

  “No, she likes it. Really,” Poppy said earnestly.

  “OK then, let’s go.”

  It was the first time Emma had been ‘below stairs’, and she was intrigued when Poppy led her into a part of the house she had not seen before, through a concealed door which looked like part of the corridor wall, and down what were evidently the backstairs. They were of bare wood, uncarpeted and dusty, but the smell of food drifted up them like a friendly ghost. Poppy pattered down with evident familiarity, all the way from the top to the bottom of the house, emerging into a dim, flagstoned corridor lined with panelled cupboards, and pushing through another door into the kitchen.

  It was warm and full of the smell of baking; sunlight streamed in through a high window. The walls were of rough whitewashed stone and the floor stone-flagged, wavy with centuries of footsteps. There was a large old-fashioned deal table, and an ancient built-in pine dresser, but otherwise everything was modern: strip-lights in the ceiling, modern cupboards and units, a huge steel industrial cooking-stove, racks of stainless steel pots and pans overhead, an enormous dishwasher and a big American-style larder-fridge the size of a wardrobe. Under the vast Tudor chimney a four-oven Aga looked almost lost, and in front of it Mrs Grainger was sitting with her feet up on a stool, having a cup of tea and reading the Daily Mirror.

  She looked up and smiled as they came in. “Ah, there you are. Let you off, has she?” she said to Poppy.

  “You did say,” Poppy answered defensively, out of her chronic anxiety.

  “I did say,” Mrs Grainger agreed economically.

  “I hope we aren’t disturbing you?” Emma put in.

  “Not a bit. I was hoping to meet you, and I knew They’d never bring you down. So I told Poppy I’d make some buns.” She nodded towards the Aga, on top of which the promised Chelsea buns were cooling on a wire rack. “Can I offer you a cup of tea, Miss Ruskin?”

  “Emma, please. Yes, I’d love one, thank you.”

  “Me too?” Poppy pleaded.

  Mrs Grainger looked sidelong at Emma. “You’re supposed to have milk. It’s better for you.”

  “I don’t like milk. Please can’t I have tea, Emma? I always do down here.”

  “Tattle-tail, giving me away!” Mrs Grainger chided her.

  Emma thought of her own childhood home, where everyone drank strong orange tea from babyhood upwards. It never did them any harm. “I won’t tell. And tea is supposed to be good for the heart, now, isn’t it?”

  “Is it? They’re always changing the rules, aren’t they?” Mrs Grainger said placidly, pouring the tea. Poppy and Emma pulled up chairs, and the buns were transferred to a plate and dredged with sugar. They were soft, fragrant, sticky, bursting with fruit, and more delicious than anything Emma had ever tasted before. Shop buns were the palest, feeblest imitation beside them, and Emma said so.

  “I’m glad you like them,” Mrs Grainger said, looking pleased. “I really enjoy baking, you’ve always got something to show at the end of it. Yeast baking especially. But I get precious little chance these days, unless the boys are home. Mr Akroyd likes his cake hearty, but he’s never here; and her ladyship only wants the dainty stuff if she has afternoon tea.”

  “Well count me in, any time you’ve got buns to get rid of,” Emma said. “This is sheer heaven.”

  “And how are you settling in? Finding your way around all right?”

  “Yes, thank you. Poppy’s showing me everything, bit by bit.”

  “I was hoping to get to see you. I said to Bill to ask you to come down for tea some time—”

  “Bill?”

  “Bill Atkins, the chauffeur.”

  “Oh yes. Sorry, I didn’t know his first name.”

  Poppy finished her first bun and asked if she could have another. “Yes, as long as you don’t spoil your lunch,” Mrs Grainger said. Poppy took another and began nibbling it in a circle, unrolling it as she went. “Take it with you and go and see the kittens, why don’t you?” the cook suggested beguilingly.

  “Can I? Are they still in the boot room?”

  “Yes, but watch you don’t let them out. And mind Tigger doesn’t scratch you.”

  Poppy disappeared, bun in hand, through another door. Mrs Grainger turned to Emma. “I didn’t want to talk about her while she was listening, but I wanted to say how much better she’s been since you’ve come. There was a time I was really worried about her. She would hardly eat a thing except sweets, and it was making her ill.”

  “She’s still very thin,” Emma said.

  “Yes, but Anna and Julie tell me she’s eating much better now. They always keep an eye on her plate for me and report back. She’s been a very unhappy child, you see.”

  “I understand she was at school for a while.”

  “Yes, but she didn’t fit in there. The other girls teased her, and the teachers didn’t stop it. Anyway, Poppy got really unhappy and even tried running away, but her dad gave her a lecture and said she’d got to stay, so she just went into a decline and made herself ill. Came back at the end of term like a shadow, and then Jean Henderson stepped in and said enough was enough and persuaded Gavin to make Mr Akroyd to let her stay home.”

  “Gavin?”

  Mrs Grainger looked at her, eyebrows raised. “Oh yes, he loves that kid. Ever since she was born, he’s doted on her. He’s practically like a father to her, and she worships the ground he walks on, as I expect you know. Trouble is, he’s got so much else to do, he hasn’t got the time to spend with her. And he’s been away from home so much in the past couple of years, he hasn’t been able to keep an eye on her.”

  “I’m surprised,” Emma said. “I mean, I’m very pleased that she has someone who cares for her, but I wouldn’t have thought Gavin would be the type to—” She paused, not wishing to offend.

  “Oh, there’s a lot of good in that young man,” Mrs Grainger said. “I know he can seem stand-offish, but he’s had a lot to put up with one way and another, and he’s very shy, though you mightn’t think it.” Emma didn’t. “Harry and Jack are all charm and easy manners, but Gavin’s more serious-minded. He can’t just be social like them.”

  “I suppose they learn that at public school.”

  “That’s part of it. Oh, I’m no snob, I think Eton does them a
lot of good. It’s a pity Gavin never had the chance to go there. He went to boarding school, but it was quite a different sort of place; but then Mr A didn’t know what he knows now. He hadn’t married into the nobility then. You know Gavin was the son of Mr Akroyd’s first wife? Yes, well, there’s always been a lot of family tension. Her ladyship hasn’t got any time for him, despite the fact that it’s him that keeps everything together – the estate and everything. But of course she resents the fact that it will all go to him and not one of her own boys.” She looked at Emma defensively. “I suppose I’m speaking out of turn a bit, but you’ll find out for yourself sooner or later. And of course he’s got no respect for her, especially over the way she’s treated Poppy – or not treated her, really.”

  “It seems a very unhappy household, one way and another,” Emma commented. “I wonder he doesn’t leave – set up on his own somewhere.”

  “I expect he would have, if it hadn’t been for Poppy. He doesn’t trust anyone else to look after her. He doesn’t want her growing up like Zara, you see – wants her to get exams and have a career and everything, so she can be independent.”

  Emma decided to satisfy her curiosity on another subject. “Tell me, why does Zara dislike me? As far as I know, I haven’t given her any reason to.”

  “Zara?” Mrs Grainger smiled at her. “Oh, that’s easy! I should have thought you’d have realised—”

  At that interesting moment the kitchen door from the main part of the house opened and Mrs Grainger broke off abruptly. It was Gavin.