A Season of Secrets

by Margaret Pemberton

  There was a beat of stunned silence at the other end of the line and then she said uncertainly, ‘Yes, Lord Fenton. Of course. If that’s what you would like.’

  ‘Gilbert,’ he corrected gently.

  ‘Yes . . . Gilbert.’

  Even though he couldn’t see her, he knew she was blushing furiously.

  ‘This is a lovely surprise,’ she said, as he walked her from the bus to where the Riley was parked outside the Pig and Whistle. ‘I haven’t been on the moors for ages and ages.’

  ‘Me neither.’ He smiled down at her – everything all right in his world simply because she was by his side.

  He’d left his spaniels in the back seat of the car, and there was an outcry of frenzied barking as the dogs recognized Carrie.

  ‘Silly things!’ Carrie said affectionately, giving them a lavish fuss before settling down in the front passenger seat.

  He closed the door on her, ignored the raised eyebrows of Mrs Mellor, who was on her way to the post office, then walked around the Riley and slid behind the wheel.

  ‘I’m just back from Berlin,’ he said, turning on the engine and putting the car into gear. ‘Violet is coming home soon, perhaps within a couple of weeks.’

  ‘For a holiday or for good?’

  It felt strange sitting beside him in such close intimacy. She remembered the occasion when he had come to Monkswood for her in a taxi to ask her to stand in for Mrs Huntley, when Mrs Huntley had had to make an emergency dash to Leeds Infirmary to see her daughter.

  Then it had been dark, and they had been seated even closer together in the rear of the car. She had been able to smell the lemon tang of the cologne he used, and had known that if she had moved her gloved hand by even a fraction, it would have brushed against the back of his.

  Today, separated by the gearstick, they were seated a little further apart, but there was no third party with them, as there had been when they’d been in the taxi.

  ‘For good,’ he said in answer to her question as he drove out of the village. ‘Though I doubt whether she will be at Gorton, or even London, for long. I rather think home, for Violet, means Hollywood.’

  ‘I’d much rather think of her in Hollywood than in Berlin.’

  ‘So would I,’ he said fervently.

  He glanced across at her, his eyes meeting hers. ‘The stories about Violet and the Reich Minister for Information and Propaganda, and the commander of the Luftwaffe, are not as they seem, Carrie. Violet can’t wait to put Berlin behind her – and neither can Olivia, though for Olivia, of course, it is a little more difficult, seeing as how Berlin is her marital home.’

  She understood perfectly how difficult things must be for Olivia, and she also understood why, in speaking of Goebbels and Göring, Gilbert had avoided speaking their names. Speaking their names would, she knew, have been more than he could easily bear.

  She said sympathetically, ‘You must miss them –Violet and Olivia.’

  ‘I do.’ He wanted to tell her how much he always missed her, too, but didn’t want to lead up to a declaration of his feelings for her in the car – and particularly not when he was still driving it. ‘Tell me about Monkswood,’ he said, as the road out of Outhwaite began climbing up to the edge of the moors. ‘It must be tediously quiet when Lydia is away and there are no weekend house-parties.’

  ‘It is quiet, but not tediously so. Monkswood is a big house, even bigger than Gorton. There is always something to be done, and sometimes things are easier to do when – apart from the staff – the house is empty.’

  The spaniels put their front paws on the back of Carrie’s seat and began nuzzling the back of her neck.

  ‘Down, Coco! Down, Leo!’ Gilbert said, knowing that with the slightest encouragement the dogs would be in the front seat and on Carrie’s knee.

  Carrie knew it too, and would have rather liked it. There were no pet dogs at Monkswood and she missed the company and affection that dogs gave.

  The narrow road merged into a rutted track feathered with snow, and beneath a wide sky the moors fanned out on either side of them, glittering under a blanket of pristine white.

  Gilbert eased the Riley onto the verge and came to a halt, glad to see that as well as a warm coat and Fair Isle knitted beret and gloves, Carrie was wearing wellingtons.

  ‘I like the view from here. It looks out over the valley towards the house,’ he said, as he opened the back door of the car and, with frenzied barking and tails wagging, the dogs clambered out into crystalline air.

  Side by side and with the dogs at their heels, they walked a short stretch of moor to where the land fell away and there was a view of the valley and the curving river and the bridge.

  And beyond the bridge, sheltered by a backdrop of trees, Gorton Hall.

  As they came to a halt, gazing down at it, Carrie said, ‘This has always been a favourite place of mine. When I was eight years old I sat not far from where we are now standing, hugging my knees and grieving for my father and looking down at Gorton, sick with nerves because I was to go there later that day for the very first time.’

  ‘To play with Thea and Olivia?’

  She nodded, turning towards him. ‘Though I didn’t know it then, it was the most important day of my life.’

  ‘Because our family became your family?’

  She nodded again, her eyes overly bright. Snow had begun falling and flakes were beginning to rest on her Fair Isle beret and on her hair.

  Gilbert’s heart lurched in his chest. She shone with beauty, both inside and out, and he knew that if she said ‘yes’ when he proposed to her, he would be the luckiest man in God’s creation.

  He said, ‘Just as that day was the most important day in your life, Carrie, so today could be the most important in mine. I’m going to ask you something on which all my future happiness depends.’

  A stray snowflake landed on her cheek and he took his glove off, brushing it tenderly away. Then, as her eyes widened, he took her hands in his, his heart pounding like a piston. ‘I love you, Carrie. I love you more than anything in the world and I want you to marry me. I know this is so unexpected you can’t possibly give me an answer straight away—’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘ – and so, because I don’t want to be given the wrong answer, I want you to think about it very carefully—’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘ – and if you could learn to love me just a little bit, I promise you I will make you happy.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said for the third time. ‘Yes, I will marry you, Gilbert. And I don’t have to think about it.’

  Her eyes were shining, her rosy-cheeked face radiant. ‘I’ve been in love with you ever since I was seventeen or eighteen. There is nothing I would like more in the world than to be your wife.’

  Gilbert’s head reeled. Whatever the response he had hoped for, her response exceeded it so immeasurably that he was momentarily stupefied.

  Fleetingly he thought of the decades he had wasted; decades they could have been together, if only he had been more perceptive about her feelings, and more perceptive about his own.

  The wasted decades didn’t matter. What mattered was now.

  ‘Will you mind very much being married in a register office?’ he asked, taking her in his arms. ‘Because of my divorce, a church wedding is out of the question.’

  She said fiercely, so happy she felt as if she was flying, ‘I’d marry you in a bus station.’

  He burst into laughter, hugging her tight, the years that separated them melting away.

  Then, his eyes darkening with heat, he lowered his head to hers.

  He kissed her gently at first and then, as her lips opened like a flower beneath his, with increasing passion, not raising his head from hers until both of them were breathless.

  Still holding her close, knowing that after twenty years he had found true love again, he said huskily, ‘I have something for you, my darling.’

  He felt inside his coat to his waistcoat, withdrew the ring-
box that had been lying snug against his heart and lifted the lid.

  Carrie drew in a deep, unsteady breath.

  ‘It belonged to Blanche,’ he said of an exquisite antique garnet-and-pearl ring. ‘I’m certain she would have wanted you to have it: as an engagement ring, if you would like, or – if you would prefer a different ring as an engagement ring – to wear as a dress ring, as she wore it.’

  Barely able to speak, her throat was so constricted with emotion, Carrie said, ‘I should very much like to wear it as my engagement ring, Gilbert.’

  As snow began falling thickly around them, he removed the glove from her left hand and slid the ring onto her wedding finger.

  She gazed down at it with a mixture of wonderment and joy and then, as his arms tightened around her and he lowered his head once more to hers, she parted her lips for more of the kisses she had waited for, for so long.

  Snow was also falling in Richmond.

  ‘I think that’s enough Christmas shopping for now, don’t you?’ Roz said to Thea as they stepped out of a bookshop after buying a copy of the worldwide bestselling novel Gone with the Wind for Carrie. ‘For one thing, we’ve come to the bottom of our list, and for another, even if we hadn’t, I simply can’t carry any more parcels. My arms are giving out.’

  ‘Home then?’

  ‘Home,’ Roz agreed, looking forward to the warmth of Gorton’s roaring log fires.

  The taxicab office was on the opposite side of the market place and, as they walked gingerly towards it over the icy cobbles, Thea said suddenly, ‘I’m trying really hard to be full of Christmas spirit, Roz, but the truth is it’s all pretend. I don’t have an ounce of it inside me.’

  Roz came to a halt, uncaring that the snow was coming in ever thickening flurries. ‘Because of Hal?’

  Thea nodded, her narrow dark-lashed eyes bright with tears.

  Roz moved a heavy parcel from one arm to the other. ‘Let’s go into a cafe for a pot of tea before getting a cab. I’ve never asked about Hal’s death, because you’ve so obviously not wanted to talk about it, but for you to talk about it now might come as a relief.’

  ‘Yes.’ The blood had drained from Thea’s face. ‘I need to talk about it – and Hal would want me to tell you how he died. Until now, though, I’ve felt talking about it would undo me completely; and if that happened, I might never get the pieces of myself back together again.’

  ‘And now you think you might?’

  ‘I don’t know, Roz.’ There was despair in her voice. ‘But I can’t keep silent about if forever, can I?’

  They went into a small teashop only yards away from the taxicab office. It was packed with people taking a breather from Christmas shopping, but they managed to get a corner table, and Thea seated herself so that her back was to the room and she was facing Roz and, on the wall, a faded print of Jervaulx Abbey.

  Roz ordered a pot of tea and Thea drew in a deep, unsteady breath. ‘Spain was a nightmare, Roz. Nothing was as either Hal or I had thought it would be. The shortage of weapons was unbelievable. None of the Barcelona militias received weapons from the government. Their arms were hunting rifles, worn-out Mausers that jammed, and shotguns previously used for shooting rabbits and hares. Worse than that, though, was the way that atrocities by the Nationalists would be answered by atrocities from our fellow Republicans.’

  She came to a halt, unable to continue.

  The waitress brought them their pot of tea. Roz poured it and added milk and a spoonful of sugar to each cup.

  After a little while Thea said unsteadily, ‘Hal and I hadn’t seen each other for months. I was in Barcelona, driving ambulances for the Red Cross and helping out in the city’s clinics. Hal had been fighting with other members of the International Brigades further down the coast.

  From outside the cafe came the sound of carollers singing ‘Away in a Manger’.

  Thea put her hands around her cup of tea, but made no effort to lift it to her lips.

  ‘The fighting ended in overwhelming defeat, but Hal was not horribly wounded and neither was he captured. Somehow he made his way back to Barcelona and – oh, Roz – it was so bloody marvellous to know he was still alive and to be together again!’ She closed her eyes, reliving the moment when Hal had leapt down from the moving tram; when they had raced towards each other in the crowded street and he had kissed her, for what neither of them had known was the last time.

  It was a long time before she opened her eyes and spoke again.

  ‘We were walking towards our flat, and a few yards in front of us there was an elderly priest. A lorry with men in the back of it wearing anarchist neckerchiefs rounded a corner, heading towards us. Because the Catholic Church is on the side of the Nationalists, priests in Barcelona keep low profiles. This priest didn’t. As the lorry drew level with him, he shook his fist at the solders and spat. The lorry skidded to a halt.’

  Her face was as white as the cloth on the table in front of them.

  ‘The men jumped down from it and raced towards the old man. It all happened so fast, Roz. They were shouting “Nationalist pig!” And the next minute the old man was on the ground being kicked and beaten, and Hal had raced to protect him. Then one of the men hauled the priest to his feet and put a gun to his head.’

  She stopped and opened eyes so full of grief and pain that Roz felt her heart turn over.

  Thea’s voice sank to a whisper. ‘Hal leapt towards him, knocking the gun so that it fired upwards, and in the same split second there were other shots. I saw parts of the priest’s skull fly into the air, and Hal buckled at the knees, blood pouring from his chest.’ She made a helpless, hopeless movement with her hand. ‘I rushed towards him and the men headed back to their lorry. Hal was still alive and, as the lorry drove off and I held Hal in my arms, he said . . . he said . . .’ She struggled to continue, tears pouring down her face. ‘He said, “I love you, Thea. I always have.” And then, as the blood pumping from his chest spilled over my hands and into the ground, he said, “This is a bugger of a way to die, love.” And died.’

  For a long time neither of them spoke again: Roz because she couldn’t think of anything she could possibly say that would bring Thea a shred of comfort, and Thea because for her there was nothing left to be said.

  At last Roz said gently, ‘Let’s go home, Thea. Carrie will be there by now, waiting for us to decorate the tree.’

  Thea nodded, saying as she rose to her feet, ‘I wish Carrie was always at Gorton, Roz. It’s where she belongs.’

  Then, her face etched with grief and loss, she followed Roz out of the cafe and into the snow-covered market place.

  Chapter Forty

  The Christmas party at Carinhall, Hermann Göring’s vast estate an hour’s drive north of Berlin, was in full swing. Though Hitler was not present, all other members of the Nazi hierarchy were, some accompanied by a wife, others by a mistress or girlfriend, others – as Göring’s parties were famous for the number of glamorous actresses that attended them – merely on the prowl for a new mistress or girlfriend.

  Carinhall parties were always mammoth productions. At this one, the baby lions kept by Göring as pets frolicked in an outdoor enclosure, with red ribbons tied around their necks. Reindeer with silver-painted antlers roamed in the grounds nearest to the house. In the forested part of the estate horse-drawn sleighs raced along snowy paths, bells tinkling.

  Violet wasn’t in the mood for a sleigh-ride, or for a party at which the guests were so numerous they could have filled a football stadium. Her day had been spent on a film set at Babelsberg and she had a vile headache. Making her headache worse was Luther Schultz. He had been stalking her since the moment she arrived and, no matter how hard she tried to lose herself in the throng, she could feel his hard, lascivious eyes always on her.

  It was Margarete Himmler, wife of the chief of Germany’s police force, who enabled her to shake free of Schultz. Seeing Kripo’s second-in-command standing in an island of isolation, she made a beeline for hi
m and Schultz had no option but to transfer his full attention to her.

  Aware that she was no longer under Schultz’s scrutiny, Violet did a swift about-turn, not wanting him to be able to find her easily again. She also needed a quiet, dark room in which to recover from her headache, and she had been a guest often enough at Carinhall to know where she would find one.

  Threading her way through the crush of guests, she made her way up the opulent staircase and along a corridor, until she came to the door of a room too far from the head of the stairs to be a magnet for couples seeking a little privacy.

  The room was dark, the curtains drawn. Gratefully Violet felt her way towards the bed and lay down on it, closing her eyes. Under normal circumstances at a party such as this she would have been circulating, listening for careless gossip about the Führer’s plans.

  She had already furnished her contact at the US Embassy with the information that, in March, Hitler intended marching his armies into what remained of Czechoslovakia. Goebbels had told her that, with Czechoslovakia under his belt, Hitler was then going to invade Poland – and that was why Violet was still in Berlin, for if she could get documentary proof, it would, she knew, finally put an end to the British government’s disastrous appeasement policy.

  There came the sound of footsteps weaving unsteadily down the corridor, and of feminine giggles.

  Violet held her breath, but the footsteps came to a halt not at her door, but at the door of the room next to hers.

  She sat up and swung her legs from the bed. Listening to two people making love was not, in her book, the best way to defeat a headache.

  There came the sound of someone stumbling, and then a woman’s voice said, ‘Es ist hier dunkel. Wo ist der Lichtschalter?’

  There came a click as the light-switch was found, and then another voice, also female, said, ‘Dieses Kokain ist das beste, Hedda. Vertau mir.’

  Aware now that the privacy of the room had been sought in order to snort cocaine, Violet lay down again. If that was what Hedda and her friend wanted to do, it was fine by her. All she wanted was to be left in peace.