by Jane Jakeman
I still relive those moments. My strength is waning as the blood pours from my hand and I do not manage to break his hold. Together we fall through the door of the room and roll down the staircase, and when we reach the bottom, the crippled angel is astride my back, wrenching back my head like that of an animal being made ready for sacrifice. The wire is biting into my throat now, throttling me, I can feel the blood roaring in my ears and my precarious hold on daylight vanishes as the world goes black.
Then there is another explosion.
This time, it is not thunder.
There is a smell of burning that is not the sulphurous smell of the storm.
I can see again. The pressure on my hand eases. A head with wet yellow hair, a blond and once-beautiful head, falls back. Blood gushes disgustingly from the man’s mouth.
She stands at the top of the stairs, my pistol smoking in her hand. That, pistol, fallen in the struggle, which she has picked up and fired.
There she is, with the weapon clutched tightly. She stands stock still, her skirts moving in the eddies and draughts generated by the winds of the storm.
The creature at the bottom of the stairs is not dead. He is dying, though. The pistol has shot him in the back: the blood pouring from his mouth has the frothiness of blood coming from the lungs. He turns his face and looks up the stairs.
The blood gurgles in his throat and his head falls back.
I go up the staircase and she is still at the top, staring, her eyes fixed, all the while, as I mount step by step, swaying with the loss of blood, and take the pistol from her hand. Without a word I enter her room, seize a towel, wrap it round my hand, and propel Marie gently through the door of her bedroom.
We stare at each other for a few moments: I am looking at the woman who saved my life.
“I know, Marie,” I say. “I know who he was.”
CHAPTER 20
“His name was De Carme,” I said, a little later.
That was afterwards; there was an anticlimax while Marie burst into sobs and I stammered my apologies.
“I’m so desperately sorry — how could I have mistrusted you so? I had got to the point of thinking you had killed your husband and the old man, fool that I am. I worked it out all quite wrongly, you see. He killed them both, of course he did. He came here looking for Elisabeth — burst in while they were sitting at the table, probably, and was half-crazed with rage and jealousy. And he must have killed Tom, too — perhaps Tom found him skulking round the farm and suspected him. The gypsy was incidental — he had the cursed bad luck to enter the farmhouse just after the killings, when you found him. He is a thief, perhaps, but not a murderer.”
I had unlocked the door of Elisabeth’s room — what a mistrustful idiot I had been, to lock those women in! I had carefully secured the victims under lock and key, while the real danger, the murderer, roamed unchecked.
So Elisabeth stood at the entrance to the room, as Marie sobbed with the intensity of her reaction, and I swung towards her and said: “His name was De Carme. Richard De Carme. He would have killed me if it were not for the courage of Mistress Crawshay here. Why did you not tell us of this — why did you not warn me?”
Elisabeth was silent for a few moments. Then she came in and put an arm around the shoulders of the weeping Marie, who pushed her away, as if rejecting a false comforter.
“I could not bring myself to tell you the full history of my unhappy love and marriage. Oh, I did wrong, I know that now, not to place the whole truth at your disposal, and write you a more honest account of affairs. But truly, I thought no harm thereby — merely that my feelings … that I need not disclose my feelings … But I will tell you both everything — you and Marie. First, let me take the child safely out of the room.”
Marie had heard our conversation, and she stood up and herself picked up the child, who miraculously seemed unafraid and drowsy, and took him out of the room, to return a few minutes later.
“He’s asleep! Oh, thank God he’s safe! I care about nothing but my child!”
She sat down on the great feather bed and looked at Elisabeth with an accusing glance.
“You had better tell us everything. Who was that … that creature?”
It was a long story that Elisabeth had to tell.
“When I married Richard De Carme, he was not at all the man that you saw. He was full of life and energy then.
“His family had an estate in Normandy, and we met them often socially when my parents visited France. He was of a very good English family, but one with plenty of blue blood and little money. To tell you the truth, I believe they were living in France in order to avoid creditors in England. It was not long before my parents withdrew from their society, for they did not approve of the De Carmes’ way of life. The young men, Richard and his brothers — they would bet on anything, not just horses. It seemed that anything that came along might be cause for a wager; they gambled on sports, on prize-fighters, on the number of puppies that might be born in a litter, on the bumpers of champagne that could be consumed at one sitting, on anything that could be punched, kicked, jumped, swallowed, thrown, fired or caught.
“Of course, there were quite a few English exiles of this sort in France. Every year you will read a few lines in the paper, recording that some such Englishman has shot himself or poured acid down his throat, or been killed in a duel, in some town such as Dieppe or Boulogne, after being reduced to indigence and no longer supported by his family. You will recollect that Beau Brummel, once a leader of fashion and companion to the Prince Regent, was reduced by his debts at the last to a filthy old creature living in a French boarding-house, his one remaining worldly delight being to creep along to the pâtisserie for custard tarts, when he could beg a few centimes from some English visitor.
“Not many exiles suffered such a spectacular fall as Brummel. And I, an innocent girl, did not at all understand that might be the fate that awaited young Richard De Carme, as handsome as an angel, so gallant. His exploits, his wagers and breakneck rides across country, the duels and the drinking — these all seemed to me, who was from the most cautious and prudent of homes, quite dazzlingly worldly: I thought Richard De Carme could give me all the sights and excitements my quiet upbringing had denied me. In short, I fell helplessly in love with him.
“My parents were extremely worried, I realise that now. Richard was mightily prepossessing; he had the most charming manners of any creature I have ever met, and my mother nearly succumbed to them and might have agreed to our marriage. But my father was adamant, suspecting Richard of being a mere fortune-hunter. I was forbidden to see him, forbidden to write, or to have any form of contact whatsoever with any member of the De Carme family.
“Well, you know what young people are like. When my parents forbade me to see Richard, I fell deeper in love with him than ever before. One morning during a visit to Normandy, when Mother wondered where I was and why my bed had not been slept in, she found that her daughter, with what little jewellery of my own I possessed, and a fast horse from the stables, had vanished into the night. Oh, I desperately regret it now, that I was so foolish, but I had continued to correspond secretly with Richard and it was not difficult, with little bribes here and there, to find servants who would carry messages between us. And bribes were not always needed, for there are always foolish old hearts around to indulge young people and carry on intrigues where they suspect affections are blossoming. The middle-aged are flattered by being taken into the confidence of the young, I fancy. My French godmother would not forbid us to meet at her house, and so we laid plans, until at last I left my parents’ protection and joined Richard, as I thought, for all our years to come, for the rest of my life.
“We headed towards England, thinking to put the Channel between my parents and ourselves, and determined to marry at the first place we could stop.”
“That place was a small town near Rouen,” said I, “and I have seen the record of your civil marriage in the registers of the Mairie there. ‘E
lisabeth Madeleine Anstruther and Richard De Carme, both being persons of English nationality, on the fourteenth of September, eighteen twenty-eight.’”
She was astonished. “How came you by this information? I thought I had kept my marriage secret from all the world.”
“You and your husband stayed in Falaise above a month, for a particular reason, I believe.”
“Why, yes, we had but a few guineas between us, and Richard thought to make some money at horse-trading. He thought he was a famous judge of horse-flesh, and it was the pursuit of a gentleman, after all; Richard could never resist a horse-fair. His idea was to purchase and break in some foals, and then to breed up some fine hunters and carriage-horses, and take them over for sale in the English rings, where he might see a fine profit. He had been conversing with the ostlers in the auberge at Falaise, the Lion d’Or, and he had learned — ”
“That there was a great horse-fair shortly to be held at Guibray, just outside the town … ”
“You are a magician, my lord! How did you divine all this?”
“Never mind, I’ll tell you later. Go on — what did your husband do?”
“He watched the parade of horses going through their paces at Guibray and picked out two fine black animals that would make a perfectly matched carriage pair.
“He did not discover for some days that he had been cheated, and that one of the horses had white socks which had been dyed black, to persuade Richard into thinking he was buying a perfect pair.
“So there was the biggest part of his profit gone, and worse, he had been made a fool of. I had never seen him in a rage before: he cursed and shouted and hurled his glass to the ground — he was like a child in his fit. Still, I thought it was but one occurrence and that he had some cause, for indeed he had been cruelly gulled.
“Well, he sold the horses for what he could get and we made our way to England, fearing pursuit by my parents if we remained in France.
“Then we began the restless life of horse-traders. From fair to fair we tramped, and each time trading down, each time losing a little more of our tiny capital, staying in inns of lower and lower quality.
“My husband was not equipped for such a life of poverty and restraint: he bore it ill. Several times he lost his profits by foolish purchases. Sometimes he drank too heavily, and then he was so fuddled a child could have deceived him.
“Our small funds dwindled and dwindled till at last I knew not where to turn to pay the reckoning in the humble taverns where we stayed in the poorest rooms. My small stock of jewellery was soon dispersed and my husband’s way of life promised no improvement in our fortunes; that was something I understood within a few months of our marriage. Of course, I appealed to my family in desperation. But they were deaf to my entreaties and not even my mother replied to my letters.
“There were dark shadows now in my husband’s mind; he drank to keep them away, but they redoubled after every drinking bout. He picked quarrels, harped on grievances. He got an injury to his leg falling under the hooves of a terrified mare in the stables of an inn. He was too drunk to get to his feet.
“Within a year of our marriage, I had nothing left for him but pity, as he spent his nights raging and weeping and his days in the taverns. I believe it might be a hereditary weakness, for his grandfather, so I have heard, was thus. Finally, my husband took to blaming me for his ill fortune, and said I had brought him bad luck, that he had won nothing, had no success at any wager, had made no profit, since he had met with me.
“I will not say that he had no love for me, for perhaps he did when we were first together, but when he understood that my father would really do nothing for us, that my family would pursue their coldness towards me and that no help would be forthcoming from that direction, then his talk became wild and full of hatred. He turned so against me that I was sometimes frightened to move or speak when the fit of anger was upon him, and I spent one whole night sitting bolt upright against the casement, fearing for my life.
“The next day, I fled. I gathered together a little money in my purse, which I had obtained by selling to the mistress of the tavern some of my clothes, my lace and my kid gloves, which I could never have occasion to wear. Below the window, I could see a stagecoach preparing to leave the inn in the early hours of the morning. I cared not what its destination might be, and took a place as far as the coach would travel. Thus, the next day, I found myself in the marketplace at Callerton, with scarcely enough money for a few days’ lodging, and I knew that I must get some sort of work to keep body and soul together, but what employment might I expect? I could think of nothing but that I might offer myself as a governess.
“Yet what respectable household would take me in, with my history? I imagined my own mother, confronted with the prospect of engaging someone with such a story as my own. ‘Quite out of the question, I’m afraid. The girl has no character to show me, no references. She has never undertaken any employment of this kind before and has no experience of children. She has been disowned by her own family. And she has a drunken and disreputable husband whom she has abandoned. What is she, wife or widow? How can we take such a person into our house?’
“That is how any mistress of a household would have spoken, I assure you. So at Callerton, where I put it about that I was seeking a position as governess, when old Mr. Crawshay engaged me without question, I could not refuse him. I would have to use the last coins in my purse to pay the landlady, and after that I must go with Crawshay or starve. I had sold my wedding ring already, so he saw no ring upon my finger, and he did not know my story — he took me as governess for his grandson without question, though I believe he had his own reasons for doing so. But he knew nothing of my marriage. I myself tried to forget what I had been through.
“But then I suspected Richard was trying to track me down. Perhaps he thought I might give him some money — I’m very sure he did not follow me through love. He could have made enquiries at the inn where I left him, and so eventually traced me here.”
“Was it he who locked me in the icehouse?”
“Yes — I believe so. I think he had trailed me from the farm that evening when I came to the icehouse.” And I, even though I knew she had deceived me, longed to stroke the long, loose strands that tumbled round her shoulders, I involuntarily reached out my injured hand towards her, forgetting the pain of it. I had recognised those fine threads of hair as soon as I had seen them on old Crawshay’s body, so alert was I to her physical being, to every hair that sprung on her head, to every movement of her flesh, every drop of her sweat, even. But I held back, as she continued her story.
“Yes, I think he followed me, and to imprison you in the icehouse would have been exactly the kind of joke he enjoyed. He would have laughed, I think. He found dead things funny. And dying creatures, too. He laughed at them. He enjoyed looking at them. But he was not a killer — no, I did not believe he would kill.”
She shuddered and pulled her chair closer to the fire.
“But why did you not tell me?” I asked her. “You hid it all from me and I found out the truth only because the gypsy’s woman told me where to go for the evidence of your marriage. You see, the gypsies get about far more than we know. She and her husband had been travelling about trading in horses and donkeys, and had been at that same fair near Falaise. It’s a famous attraction for the Romanies; they come to it from far and wide.
“They knew all about the trick played upon your Richard. He was well known among the horse-traders as a gull who fancied himself with bloodstock, and the gypsy-woman had seen both of you several times, at your lodgings in Falaise where you stayed during the fair.
“They have a strict sense of honour, the gypsy clans. I had saved her man’s life when he might have been murdered by a mob at Crawshay’s farm, and I had given her my protection to get her safely away to the encampment at Callerton. She believed she owed me a debt, and the only way she could repay it was with information. She told me of the governess at Crawshay’s, tha
t mysterious woman whom she had seen before, at the Normandy fair — oh, you and your husband were the topic of much talk there, I assure you, and it was known that you were but newly married, in the town of Falaise.
“On the night when I took her to safety, that gypsy-woman told me of the place to seek evidence of your past history: it was thus she repaid me the favour I had done her, as best she could. And she was warning me, too, for they knew your husband was a man of uncontrollable temper.”
Elisabeth answered passionately, turning towards me and uttering the words with great feeling.
“Truly, I thought he was harmless — you must believe that. I thought he was mad, quite mad, sick in mind as in body. Would you let them put him in Bedlam? No, I see by your own face that you would not, that you think as I do on that subject — you have seen them in Bedlam, have you not? Chained in their own filth, while the paying visitors jeer and the gaolers poke them through the bars, prod them like animals so they will jump and squeal and show off their tricks, those wretched lunatics. No, I thought perhaps I could get him sent back to France, get him looked after by his family. I had loved him once, you see. He did not kill the Crawshays — so why should I suspect that he would kill anyone else? He raved and threatened, but he had never killed anyone in his life.
“In a way, it was I who caused the deaths of the Crawshays, because I concealed my marriage to Richard, and so when old Crawshay proposed marriage to me, he thought his suit would succeed and that I could become his wife. Oh yes, I am sadly at fault, Lord Ambrose, for concealing my past when I came here, for trying to make a new life for myself. I should have understood that you cannot make a break with the old life — that is merely self-deception, is it not?”
Yes, it is, thought I, and you are not the only one, Elisabeth Anstruther, to have loved not wisely but too well, and to have tried to escape the weight of your past actions. It is self-deception indeed, and I also am guilty of it. I have tried to bury myself here in the English countryside as if I had never loved and fought, never suffered the smart of betrayal, as if I were a thing of clay whose passions are all long dead.
