“It’s really none of my business.”
“Doesn’t it worry you – as a woman – that Sellick is threatening and coercing Elizabeth?”
“By sending Timothy to put his case, he has specifically avoided doing so.”
“You must know that’s not true. She’s dreading his visit tomorrow.”
“Needlessly.”
“I don’t think so and nor do you. Why are you doing this?”
“To advance my career. It’s an honourable aspiration, though you called it prostitution.”
I moved closer. “What else could I call it when you sell your body to Couchman and your brains to Sellick?”
“That’s enough. I don’t wish to discuss it anymore.” She turned to walk on.
I grabbed her elbow. “You bitch – did what happened on that beach mean nothing to you?”
She froze and the stiffness of her elbow made me let go. Then she turned to face me and slowly removed the dark glasses. Her eyes bore into mine. “It meant something – but not what you thought.”
“When we met at Miston Church, you denied you’d simply been keeping me out of the way so Timothy could look for the Postscript.”
“I told you the truth. It wasn’t as simple as that.”
“Then what?”
“Let me ask you a question. You’ve appointed yourself Elizabeth’s protector. But what have you actually done to help her? What will you do to stop Sellick forcing her to comply?”
There was a long pause – a gulf for me to stare across at my own inadequacy – before I heard myself answer in a hollow murmur. “Nothing.”
“There’s your answer to what Timothy has to offer. He satisfies me, which you never could.”
“But when we went to Braunton, and afterwards in Topsham – you can’t pretend …”
“Oh, but I did. That’s just what I did. I pretended … everything.”
She slid back the dark glasses. I suppose I saw her walk away across the green, but I can’t remember. All she’d meant to me ended with that last admission. The point of her pretence escaped me, as it was meant to. But the blatancy of it remained long after she’d gone, staring and grinning at me, her superiority – her deliberate mystery – superimposed on the face of my private demon.
Darkness fell that evening on our thinking time, time ran out in our retreat from Sellick. At Quarterleigh, Elizabeth contemplated the bitter pass a hopeful invitation had brought her to. At Rackenfield, I drunkenly surveyed the road I’d led her down. Those who’d trusted me – Ambrose and Elizabeth – had suffered. Those who’d deceived me – Eve, Timothy and Sellick – stood to triumph. It was too much to take.
But there was no escaping it – even in sleep. Indeed, dreams were fast and sure enough to find whatever furtive refuge my thoughts might flee to.
“Martin, Martin! Wake up!”
It was Dora, shaking me out of a troubled slumber at Rackenfield. “Wha … what’s the matter?”
“You’ve got to get up – I’m worried about the mistress.”
I sat up and blearily scanned her face, furrowed by concern. “Okay. What the hell’s happened?”
“I think she’s planning something … drastic.”
I pulled on a dressing gown and followed her down to the kitchen. She poured me some tea while I struggled to confront a day I’d hoped would never come. “Tell me slowly, Dora. What’s happened?”
“Well, she weren’t right all yesterday, as you’d ’ave known if you ’adn’t bin drinking yourself silly at The Oak. She went to the safe an’ took something out. Then announced she was off to Cap’n Sayers for bridge. But Monday’s never bridge night. There were some other reason an’ I think I know what it was.” She paused.
“Well?”
“She come back about the time I was leaving, not at all ’er usual self. Seemed almost guilty about summut. Went straight upstairs. I found some sheets to take up to the airing cupboard an’ from the landing ’eard ’er open an’ shut the drawers in that chest just inside the bedroom door.”
“So what?”
“Well, it’s not as if she’d changed or anything. She came straight back out, closed the door behind ’er – she never does that – an’ looked real shocked to see me on the landing. Shooed me down to the kitchen like I were in the way. I knew for certain then there was summut wrong.”
“But what?”
“I didn’ get a chance to find out until this morning. Straight after breakfast, she took the car out for a drive. I reminded ’er the doctor ’ad told ’er to give up driving, but she wouldn’t listen. Anyway, when she’d gone, I went up to ’er room and took a look in the chest o’ drawers. That’s where I found it – tucked away under some ’ankies in the top drawer.”
“Found what?”
Dora looked straight at me. “The gun. That there revolver of Sir Gerald’s. The one she’s kept locked up all these years. The chambers spun like they’d just bin oiled … an’ it was loaded.”
The words sunk in. “Are you sure?”
“Course I am, boy. Mr Bates used to shoot a bit. ’E taught me enough about guns to know when one of ’em’s in a state to be used.”
“But why should she take it out of the safe and carry it to the Sayers’?”
“’Cos Cap’n Sayers is a crack shot. Keeps game birds on ’is land. Even ’as a proper range out the back of ’is ’ouse – a real enthusiast. The sort o’ chap who could check over an old gun to see if it still works proper.”
I stood up. “We’ve got to do something. Do you realize what this could mean?”
She nodded. “I’m awful ’fraid she can’t face that dratted black sheep Sellick.”
“Where’s the gun now?”
“Where I found it. It’s ’er gun, after all. I got no right to mess with it.”
I looked at the clock: nearly nine o’clock. Just three hours to go before Sellick called to receive a ritual surrender. I had to thrust to the back of my mind all the swirling images of fate and failure and concentrate on what one day – one slice of speeding time – might hold for us all.
I flung on some clothes and hurried to Quarterleigh. There was no answer to the doorbell. I peered through the porch window: no sign of life. Anxiously, I scanned around.
Then I heard a car coming along the lane. Sure enough, it turned in at Quarterleigh: the cream Sunbeam, Elizabeth smiling beneath a headscarf as she drove down the drive. I opened the garage doors and she drove inside.
“I didn’t expect you so soon,” she said as she climbed out.
I smiled. “Couldn’t stay away.”
“Come inside and tell me why.” She led the way with a disturbing, almost feverish energy.
I made some coffee and we drank it in the lounge while I struggled to approach my suspicions. Elizabeth seemed every inch controlled and composed, reclining in an armchair and sipping coffee, confronting Sellick’s ultimatum with equanimity. “A golden gaze above a cream dress,” as Strafford had recalled on that longest day 67 years before? Not quite. Old age had given Elizabeth a fragile, silvery beauty and a tweed skirt and jacket had succeeded the Edwardian flounces. Yet something remained, some tinge of her spirit and looks that would have awed Strafford and could still move me. What worried me, though, was the heightened colour in her cheeks, the look in her eye that had lost its usual serenity.
“Where have you been?” I asked. “I thought you didn’t drive yourself anymore.”
“I drove to Harting Hill, just to prove I still could. I found it … exhilarating.”
“And did it take your mind off Sellick?”
“No, but it clarified it.”
“How?”
She smiled, with just a touch of artifice. “It made me realize how little we should fret over such problems as Mr Sellick may cause us when there is so much beauty in the world.” And in you, Elizabeth, and in you.
“So what will you tell him?”
She seemed to pull back her thoughts from a distance. “Oh, that h
e can have his way. The good name of a very old lady is a small matter, after all.” Did she really mean it? I could no longer tell.
“As simple as that?”
“I think so, Martin. It will be a brief and tame encounter. In fact, there’s no need for you to remain for it, though I’m grateful to you for coming. I can’t help but feel that your presence would only heighten his sense of triumph.”
She was trying to get rid of me. I felt sure of it. “Maybe so. I confess I’ve no alternatives to offer.”
“That’s because there aren’t any.”
Somehow, I had to find a way to check on Dora’s find. “On Sunday, you mentioned all the anniversaries that fell today. I don’t suppose they help.”
“No.” She sighed. “Edwin’s visit to me at Putney: it’s one of the descriptions in the Memoir I found especially touching.”
“‘A golden gaze above a cream dress.’”
“You remember it too.” This time her smile was genuine. “Do you know, I still have that dress, hung up in my wardrobe. A genuine antique – rather like its owner. I’m afraid I’d never fit into it now.”
I saw my opening. “I’d be fascinated to see it.”
“Then I’ll show it to you one day.”
“How about now – just to pass the time?”
She thought for a moment, then agreed. What reason, after all, could she give to refuse? We’d finished our coffee, the morning stretched ahead and it was a simple request.
We went up to her room. I stood on the threshold while she opened the door of a wardrobe and began sifting through the contents. “I’m sure it’s here somewhere,” she said.
The chest of drawers was to my right. With Elizabeth’s back turned, I’d never have got a letter chance. The wardrobe was crammed with the favoured clothes of a long life and the search was evidently going to be lengthy. “I’ve put all the dresses I’m too old for but can’t bear to throw out in here,” she mused. “Look at the shoulder-padding on this one …”
I eased open the drawer. At one end, as Dora had said, there were some handkerchiefs, not very neatly stacked. “And this cocktail dress turned some heads in 1920, I can tell you …”
I parted the handkerchiefs. There it was: somehow larger than I’d envisaged, dull and black, standard officer’s issue, Natal Field Forces, 1899. Old maybe, but made to last and made to kill.
Suddenly, silence encroached on my thoughts. I looked up. Elizabeth had stopped talking and was looking into the mirror inside the wardrobe door. It had swung back slowly on its hinges while she’d searched, the reflection moving with it. And now it had moved to me.
“What are you doing, Martin?” she asked levelly.
There was nothing for it but the truth. I lifted the gun out of the drawer. “I was looking for this. It’s your husband’s service revolver, isn’t it?”
She turned and looked at me. “What business of yours if it is?”
“Strictly speaking, none. But I hope our friendship gives me the right to act in your interests.”
“And how are you doing that?”
“You used to keep this gun locked away in the safe. You told me so yourself.”
“And may I not remove it if I wish to?”
“Of course. But Dora’s worried about you and so am I.”
“So Dora was spying on me last night.”
I moved towards her. “Not spying, Elizabeth. We just wanted to be sure you weren’t planning anything … foolish.”
“You think I’m too old to look after myself?”
“No. But a loaded gun is a dangerous …”
“Who says it’s loaded?”
“It’s easy enough to find out.” I fumbled with the gun for a moment in my efforts to open the chambers.
“Let me show you.” Holding one of my hands to steady my grip, she slipped back the catch to show a cartridge lodged in the chamber, then closed it. “You’re the one who needs protecting from himself, Martin. It is loaded and it is dangerous, but I know how to handle it and you obviously don’t. Don’t you think it would be safer with me?”
“No.” I pulled it away from her and plunged it into my jacket pocket. “I’m sorry, Elizabeth. I can’t stand by and let you endanger yourself.”
She smiled and walked away to the window, sinking into the armchair with a sigh. “I know you think you’re acting for the best, Martin – so I’ll overlook the deception you practised to get up here. The problem is: I genuinely believe you ought to let me keep the gun.”
“Why?”
“So that I can put an end to all this” – she gazed down into the garden – “bitterness.”
I felt sure then that I was right. “There are too many people who are fond of you to let you do that.”
She looked up in surprise. “Ah, I see. You thought … No, no, that’s not it at all.”
I walked towards her. “I understand how you must feel. At least, I think I do, though I must admit I hadn’t seen you as the sort of person to contemplate …”
“Suicide?”
I sat on the broad windowsill and faced her. “Yes.”
She smiled. “Then you do understand me, Martin, better than you think, because it’s true: I never would contemplate suicide. And, if I did, it would be something much less messy than shooting myself.”
I frowned. “I don’t follow. You did get this man Sayers to overhaul the gun?”
“Yes, though without knowing Dora was dogging my footsteps.” We exchanged smiles at Dora’s kindly expense. “Captain Sayers is an old friend. He’s often expressed an interest in Gerald’s revolver, so he was only too delighted to take a look at it, check the sighting, oil the moving parts and so forth, then try it out on a target in his range. It showed up remarkably well for such an old weapon.”
“Old friend or not, he had no business letting you bring it home loaded.”
She grinned mischievously. “As he’d be the first to agree. I just helped myself to half a dozen bullets from the box he’d opened to try out the gun, while his back was turned. I don’t suppose he’ll miss them.”
“But why? What’s the point if …”
Her eyes met mine. “That’s right, Martin. This old lady was going to add something much more dramatic than suicide to her family’s catalogue of misfortune. I still would, if you’d only return the gun to me. I think I could use it to good effect.”
“You must be joking.”
“No. I’m deadly serious. Don’t you see? Leo Sellick is an evil man, corrupted by the power he believes he has over us, so much so that he’ll never be satisfied with whatever we do to appease him. He’ll always come back for more. Well, I don’t propose to let that happen. There’s only one way to deal with a blackmailer.”
“Well, I’m afraid you’ll have to find some other way. The gun stays with me. Things just can’t be that bad.”
“But they are. Don’t you think I’ve racked my brains since Sunday for some way out? There isn’t one. So long as Leo Sellick lives, the destruction by degrees of my whole family will be his goal. He has the ability to achieve it and, God knows, he has good reason for wanting to achieve it too. You must let me have the gun back.”
“I’m sorry, Elizabeth, I can’t do that. I agree Sellick means to embarrass you publicly, but I’m sure that’s as far as it goes.” I wasn’t sure, of course, not at all sure. “You’ve had a lot of shocks lately. You’re under strain. You’re bound to get things a little … out of proportion.”
She sat up sharply. “Don’t patronize me, Martin, please. I’m not suffering from senile dementia. It’s you who’s got this out of proportion. I can’t force you to hand back the gun, but please realize that you’re depriving me of the only way I can resist Mr Sellick’s demands.”
I tried to soothe her. “I’ll be here when he arrives. Obviously it’s unpalatable, but, in the long run, agreeing to his terms might give him less satisfaction than fighting it out.”
“You leave me no alternative. I hope you’re
prepared to take responsibility for what happens.”
“I’ll have to. In a sense, I’m already responsible. If I’d not taken Sellick’s job in the first place …”
“He would have found somebody else to do it.” The thought seemed to calm her. “I’m glad it was you, Martin. I don’t think you could have changed what’s happened.”
It was good of Elizabeth to say so, but I knew differently. If I’d invested more time in Ambrose and less in Eve, if I’d prevented the invitation being sent to Sellick … if, ah, if only. I’d thought myself so clever, making a play for Eve while being paid well to dig out a few historical truths. But it had been the purest self-deception. Ever step of the way had been mapped for me by Sellick months before, when my gullible, friend’s journey to Madeira – all too ready to act the part written for me – started us down the road to a proud family’s humiliation. I’d connived at it myself, but without knowing what it would really mean, without knowing that, in the Couchmans’ downfall, Strafford and I would be equal victims. “Render to Elizabeth whatever assistance she may need.” It was the only guidance Strafford had left me. With that at least I could still keep faith.
“You could say,” mused Elizabeth, filling the silence I’d left, “that I’m the last person to judge Mr Sellick. After all, I misjudged Edwin and Gerald – in very different ways.”
“We’ve all been guilty of misjudgements – Sellick included.”
“Then let’s hope taking my gun wasn’t a misjudgement on your part.”
“It’s for the best. Sellick doesn’t deserve such dramatic treatment.”
“Really? We can’t forget his connection with my family, you know.” She paused and craned her neck slightly to look down into the garden. “What do you suppose was going through Gerald’s mind when he took Edwin’s place – and name – in Durban? I was married to him for forty years, yet I’ve no idea.”
“You’ve read what he had to say in the Postscript.”
“Yes – and now that’s gone too, which proves, I suppose, that Mr Sellick may not be the devil I think him to be.” It was said without conviction and its absence was contagious. Why had Sellick let us burn his proof positive?
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