Ursula's Secret

by Mairi Wilson

  “Evie, darling,” Fredi called over to her as he darted round to the side of her chair, “we simply must dance to this. It’s a new one for you – the cha-cha.”

  “Oh Fredi,” Evie laughed, “I know I asked you to teach me, but—”

  “No, no. I insist. You’ll have to dance in Blantyre. We can’t have you being a wallflower simply because the latest music passed your Highland parish by. Come on, darling!”

  “Yes, go on, Evie,” Helen encouraged. “We three will watch you mesmerise the ballroom.”

  “Gregory, I’m sorry, I—”

  “Go on, Evelyn.” Gregory was already turning away and pulling his chair nearer to Helen, beaming at her as colour tinged his cheeks. Evie knew when she was beaten.

  “Very well, but Ursula, it’s your turn next. I can’t possibly keep up with Fredi and you know he’ll want to dance all night.”

  Evie let herself be pulled into the music, glad that its volume made conversation impossible. She had a lot to think about.

  *

  “Dr Campbell rang,” a voice was saying as the door pushed open. Crockery rattled on a tin tray. “Said he’ll bring your visitor later today if he can.”

  “Good morning, Celia.”

  The nurse banged the tray down on the table beside the bed and turned, hands on hips, to look at Evie.

  “Morning, Mrs Campbell. How you today?”

  “Fit as a fiddle, my dear, sharp as a tack and bright as a button. Ready to go home, in fact.”

  The nurse grunted what passed for a laugh at Evie’s familiar morning greeting and turned to pull the table over the bed.

  “Best get you fed, then get you fancied up some in case this visitor comes. All the way from England, Dr Campbell said. Not many in here gets visitors from that far off. Royalty be coming next!” The nurse chuckled, her ample torso rippling with her mirth.

  Knowing she meant no real harm, Evie tried to join in with a gentle laugh but ended up coughing instead.

  “There, there, Mrs Campbell.” The nurse handed her a glass of tepid water. “You sip this, be right as rain.”

  Evie did as she was told, wondering, as she so often did, why people imagined a declining body signified a decline in mental age.

  9

  The Residence, June 10th

  After a restless night, Lexy was feeling a little calmer as she sipped iced tea in the shade of the verandah outside the hotel restaurant. The fruits she’d ordered over an hour ago as a token gesture towards a healthy breakfast were already wilting as they sat untouched on the plate in front of her, her mind still preoccupied with the note. It had unnerved her, but she wouldn’t let it throw her off track. She would just have to be wary. Trust no one. Yes, it was scary, but she wouldn’t allow herself to be bullied. It might just be a prank, a … a … She couldn’t begin to think why anyone might do something like that. She remembered the figure she thought she’d seen in the shadows of the trees outside Ursula’s flat in Edinburgh. Was someone watching her, following her after all? If so, it had to be something to do with Ursula, and the only thing that could be was something to do with her mysterious son. Retired hospital matrons of exemplary character hardly merited such cloak-and-dagger attention otherwise. No. If anything, Lexy should look on this as evidence that she had a good chance of getting to the bottom of all this and that was why someone was trying to frighten her off.

  Well, top marks for the pep talk, Lex, she thought to herself, and before she could start picking holes in her spurious reasoning she pulled Ursula’s folder from the backpack she’d brought down with her and which was bulging once again. She wasn’t letting any of this out of her sight now. She was no longer sure the mess she’d discovered when she’d scuttled back to her room to avoid the odious Pendleton had been of her own doing. She could easily believe someone had searched her things. So far, she’d discovered nothing missing, but then she couldn’t be sure. She had no idea exactly what was amongst Ursula’s papers, something she now intended to rectify.

  She had the verandah to herself this late in the morning, so she kicked off her sandals and curled her feet up under her in the wide winged chair, no longer surprised by the creaks of wicker that accompanied her movements. She put Ursula’s note to Izzie to one side and picked up the next batch of papers, held together by a paper clip in the top-left corner. It had rusted a little, leaving a brown imprint on the top page when she pulled it off. Fanning the papers out, she saw some were headed by dates and place names; all were written in that same copperplate she recognised from the photograph albums, but not all were as neatly composed, nor as well preserved. Some pages were splattered with exuberant punctuation, capital letters, underlinings; others appeared water-stained and blotchy; or creased as if they’d been crumpled and then smoothed flat again. There were scratchings-out in some places, as if the writing had fallen prey to some wartime censor’s pen. All the pages, she realised, had been ripped from a notebook, clearly a diary or journal of some sort, and even though they were now all bundled together, variation in the colours of papers and inks showed Lexy they hadn’t all been torn from the same book. Selected extracts from Ursula’s diaries?

  Lexy remembered her mother telling her how Ursula wrote every day without fail and then locked the diary in her desk drawer. As a child, Izzie had been intrigued by them, desperate to read these secret stories. One day she’d seen the key left in the lock and, unable to resist, she’d just been opening the drawer and reaching in when Ursula’s hand had landed heavily on her small shoulder; she spun her round and shouted at her, for the first and only time Izzie could remember. Izzie never said what it was that Ursula had actually shouted; the shock of the angry voice enough, the lesson learned.

  “You see, Lexy, everyone can shout and be angry. That’s easy. It’s much harder, but much more effective, to exercise control, judicious use of your temper.”

  The young Lexy had been puzzled. “What does that mean?”

  “If you shout all the time, no one hears you.”

  Perhaps if she’d remembered that when she was with Danny, he might have understood her better. And, of course, if you’re shouting, you’re not listening, either.

  Lexy sighed, then chuckled softly as she remembered herself rummaging through the drawer in Dr Campbell’s office. The fruit never falls far from the tree. She was indeed her mother’s daughter, although Ursula’s wrath, she was sure, would have been far more terrifying than Audrey Lanakela’s polite disapproval.

  “Can I get you anything else, Miss Shaw?” A waiter had appeared to clear the table.

  “More iced tea, perhaps.” She suspected it could be a long day going through the folder. He flapped a cloth across the table to remove the last of the crumbs and disappeared to do her bidding. She could get used to this.

  As she started to read, she realised these were indeed extracts from Ursula’s diaries, but not an Ursula she – nor her mother, she suspected – had known. As Lexy read the inner secrets of this young Ursula, truly an innocent abroad, she found herself warming to her in a way she hadn’t expected. This was a giddy, excitable, daydreaming Ursula, one Lexy was sure she would have loved had she known her, just as much as it quickly became apparent Ursula’s new-found friends Helen and Evelyn did. Ursula’s fears and insecurities were familiar: was she pretty enough? Why wouldn’t her hair curl like Helen’s? Were her dresses smart enough? Would her manners, her speech, show her up as out of place in this smart set she couldn’t quite believe had taken her into their fold? She was clearly captivated by their collective glamour, and by none more than the wealthy heiress at its centre, Helen Buchanan, daughter of the owner of the Buchanan Trading Company. Even Lexy, who’d had no time for history in school, had heard of that.

  To her relief, the diary pages started to make more sense of the names in the photograph albums. Gregory and Cameron Munro, brothers from Scotland. Gregory was about to take up the post of General Manager at Buchanan’s and was escorting Helen on the journey at her father’s
request. Cameron’s purpose in travelling was less clear, Ursula simply referring to his “special” role with the company. Evelyn Campbell was a distant cousin of Helen’s on her mother’s side, and so was travelling with them on her way to join her husband, Dr Douglas Campbell, who had already been in Africa for two years. Ursula had joined them because she would be working with Dr Campbell, so it had been arranged that she and Evelyn share a cabin. And then there was Fredi Stenberg, a Danish diplomat on his way to take up his new post, who didn’t seem to have any particular reason to join their party other than to make up numbers at their table, as far as Lexy could tell. But that didn’t seem to have mattered. They’d all obviously forged friendships that had lasted far beyond the voyage.

  Lexy swallowed back a tear or two as she read, as she learned how dazzled Ursula had been by the company she found herself keeping, and discovered more about the origins of the woman whose heir she had become, without even knowing anything of the woman’s early years. One passage in particular touched her:

  When I think of those sad, small stories we would tell each other in the dark, whispering our fantasies from bed to bed in case one of the Sisters heard us and we were marched down to the dining hall in nothing but our nightgowns to stand with our hands on our heads until our arms hurt and we started to fall asleep where we stood … Those stories full of the light and colour and laughter and warmth that we conjured up to escape from the stark, relentless grey of that awful place, the bone-eating cold, the thin soups and meagre stews ladled grudgingly into chipped bowls day in day out. When I think of all that, I want to stand up tall and shout, “Look! Look at me now! Look at the people who are my friends! I am not an unlovable monster!” Oh, if only I could have foreseen this, this magic, it would have made those dark years so much more bearable.

  I look at my new friends sometimes, though, and the old doubts return. Am I worthy? Why would people like that want to spend time with someone like me? Evie knows, I think, how I feel. And she helps. This life is new to her, too. She’s the daughter of a Highland minister, a widower, I believe, so she had no more time or opportunity than I to learn the ways of this charmed world we find ourselves in. Yet she has such confidence, such poise. I wish I could have that, too. Perhaps being married helps. She knows she is loved. That her husband has chosen to spend the rest of his life with her. How must that feel? To be loved like that. To know there will be someone beside you, to take care of you, always. Would it be too much to hope that one day, I … or is that just too silly of me? And yet, does it do any harm to hope? I’ve come this far, a fully qualified nurse, a good nurse, on my way to a position in a hospital in Africa. If an orphanage brat can manage that, who’s to say what else might be possible in that far-off land?

  So Ursula had been an orphan, too, just like Lexy herself now was, but, whatever else, however betrayed she felt right now, at least Lexy had grown up knowing she was loved.

  Lexy’s tea had arrived without her noticing, and she reached for it, wondering how Ursula could have abandoned her child to an orphanage, if indeed she had, given her own difficult experience.

  The ice in her tea had melted and the glass was slippery with condensation. She sipped slowly, holding it firmly in one hand as she turned pages with the other. After the first few breathless days, Ursula’s records became briefer, more obscure, as if she were distracted, or … or hiding something. Slowly Lexy began to understand. This was a woman whose dreams were coming true and who hardly dared write about it for fear it would all dissolve. It was a woman who was falling in love, who was being courted and wooed, enchanted by words and glances, a woman whose vulnerability was raw and evident even beneath the careful words. The question was, who was her suitor, the object of her growing affections? The diary was oddly silent on names at this point. One of the Munro brothers, perhaps, but which one? Or Fredi? Or someone else altogether, maybe even one of the no doubt dashing officers employed as much for their ability to charm the guests in their charge as for their nautical skills?

  And then abruptly, the diary extract ended. Despite her intention to be methodical, to rigidly stick to the chronology of the documents, Lexy flicked past a couple of pages of a letter to the next paper-clipped batch of torn pages. Even a quick glance showed that by the time Ursula had returned to her memoirs, the party were well established in their new lives and Ursula was hard at work in Blantyre Hospital. Lexy could see the dedicated, meticulous woman she had known emerge from the pages as hospital routines, professional concerns and observations, not always complimentary, on local practice filled the pages. No more blotches or exclamation marks, no more frantic crossings-out or sentence fragments. Precise words and orderly sentences conveyed a sense of calm, the cocktails and dancing, the excitability and extravagance of the voyage replaced with starched uniforms, ward rules and demanding schedules. Lexy missed the effervescence and awe of the earlier pages and wondered—

  “Miss Shaw?” It was Barney. “Sorry to disturb you. You have a visitor.”

  “Really?” Her heart hammered. “Who?”

  “Dr Campbell. He said he wasn’t expected but hoped you would see him anyway. He is waiting in the lobby. Shall I show him through?”

  “No,” she said quickly, remembering how trapped she’d felt by Hugh Pendleton plonking himself down in front of her at her dining table. “No, tell him I’ll just be a moment and I’ll come through.”

  Lexy gathered the folder and her notebook together and jammed them into the backpack, angry at his presumption that he could just turn up and expect to see her and at the same time acutely aware she looked a mess after her sleepless night and annoyed to find herself wishing she’d had time to freshen up.

  Lexy glanced in the bar as she passed, and then surveyed the clusters of chairs in the lobby, looking for Dr Campbell. He was sitting in the far corner near the hotel’s open, canopied entrance, resting his chin on hands clasped in front of him, as if deep in thought. Just as Lexy began to walk over to join him, a flurry of activity from the driveway outside made her falter. Barney and one of his colleagues sprang into action, and the receptionist clattered his bell and came out in front of the desk. A long white car with tinted windows had drawn up in front of the hotel steps. Barney got to the car first and opened the rear door.

  Lexy was surprised to see she recognised the man getting out. Richard Chakanaya. He swept in through the open doors, bellboys running in his wake, and the receptionist stepped forward with bowed head to welcome him. As the object of all this attention passed Lexy, he nodded at her, a brief smile twitching at his lips before he dismissed her and disappeared into the bar.

  Lexy continued over to join Dr Campbell, who was now standing and watching her closely.

  “Do you know that man?” Again, Dr Campbell was all purposefulness. No pleasantries.

  “Good afternoon, Dr Campbell,” Lexy held out her hand. “How nice to see you again.”

  He didn’t turn to take her hand, didn’t even look at it. Annoyed, Lexy sat down, expecting him to do the same, but he stood staring towards the bar for a moment longer.

  “ ‘That man’ is Richard Chakanaya, I believe,” Lexy said, to draw his attention back to her.

  “So you do know him.”

  “Well, not exactly. I know his name, that’s all. I saw him at my lawyers’, and I think he may have been on my flight. I presume he’s some kind of local celebrity given the interest and attention he seems to generate.”

  Dr Campbell’s laugh was short, more like a bark than an expression of amusement. “A celebrity. I suppose you could say that.”

  Lexy’s irritation with him increased. She’d handled things badly when they’d met previously and she was sorry about that, but he really wasn’t an easy person to get on with. Still, she was determined to maintain her dignity, to conduct this meeting, whatever its purpose, on her terms.

  “You wanted to see me, Dr Campbell.”

  “I’m sorry. I’m doing it again aren’t I? I don’t mean to, you know.
Be rude.”

  Oh, well that’s okay then, she thought, but managed to keep her face calm and the smile in place.

  “Look, can we start again?” He sounded almost sheepish. “I’m not always this boorish.”

  “Of course, Dr Campbell.” Lexy was enjoying feeling socially superior. Not something she was used to feeling given her own tendency to overreaction.

  “Robert. Please.”

  “Robert.” She inclined her head slightly. See? She could do magnanimous, too.

  “I wanted to apologise for running off like that when we met. It really was an emergency. And Audrey told me you were still waiting for me when I got back. In my office. I’d assumed you’d realise I’d be gone some time.”

  “Oh really, it wasn’t a problem. I do understand.” The altitude of that high ground she’d been standing on was decreasing as she remembered what she’d been doing when Audrey had found her.

  “I hope you were able to keep yourself occupied while you waited.”

  So, he knew. She felt her composure begin to slip. He knew she’d been rummaging through his desk, trying to read the folder.

  “As I said, it really wasn’t a problem. Was that all, Dr Camp— Robert? I have a busy afternoon ahead …”

  “Really? Well, please don’t let me keep you. Although I had hoped … You see, there’s someone I hoped you’d be able to meet. My grandmother, Evie. Evelyn Campbell. I told her about your visit, about your news. She was very close to Ursula, as we both were, and I know she’d like to meet you. We both knew your mother, too, of course. She was a regular visitor at the house when she was working here, your father, too. But if you’re busy …”

  “Oh, no, I … Nothing I can’t rearrange.” He smiled. Lexy cringed. Was she really so transparent?

  “I could take you to her this afternoon, if you were able to rearrange your schedule, of course. Three o’clock perhaps? She’s usually brightest in the afternoons and prefers to have visitors then. She’s in hospital, you see.”