Wild Wood

by Posie Graeme-Evans

  “What do you mean ‘disgraced’?” Jesse sits on the end of the bed, her face sheet-white.

  “Why do you think he practices in Newton Prior? Dr. Nicholls had—what shall we call it?—a difficulty, in Edinburgh.”

  Rape. Child of rape. The words clamor in Rory’s head but he shuts them away. “Alistair was disbarred.” He flicks a glance at Jesse. “Negligence was proved against him when a young woman died during a difficult delivery in Edinburgh—he’d been drinking. Guilt made him a full-blown alcoholic, but he fought his way back and was reregistered. He’s been an exemplary doctor all these years.” Rory turns on Helen. “And he’s your friend, Mum, he’s been so good to us.”

  Helen closes her eyes. She cannot escape the severity in his voice. “He did what he did because Elizabeth asked him to. Eva died, he was her doctor; maybe that brought it all back. Perhaps he thought he could atone for what had happened before, but he agreed that a duplicate birth certificate would name Janet as the mother, and not Eva. He thought the child would have a better future in Australia.”

  “You can use my name anytime you like, Helen.” But Jesse does not allow her voice to rise.

  The interruption is ignored. “Janet was to register the birth when she got to Australia. You didn’t need a passport for an infant in those days. No one checked. We were so trusting.” Helen’s eyes are bleak.

  Janet’s rocking on the edge of the bed. “I knew it was wrong. I always knew it. Sweet Jesus, dear God . . .” The plea is incoherent.

  Rory asks, “But how did she get it—the duplicate?”

  Helen shrugs. “There’s two laws in this country, always have been. The rich always get what they want.”

  Jesse hesitates before she grips her mother’s hand. “But don’t you have to register a birth in person?”

  “Who’s going to question a nice young woman at a Registry Office with a baby in her arms?” Janet sounds wretched. “That’s what I did. New migrant, new country, husband in tow. Many apologies for the slipup as we left Scotland . . .” She wipes her eyes and whispers, “They were very kind in Sydney. They said you were a lovely baby, that you looked just like me.” She takes a deep breath. “They hoped we would all enjoy living in Australia.”

  Jesse says slowly, “And when I found the duplicate, and the British passport office questioned it because of the registration date . . .”

  “The house of cards came down.” Helen sounds beaten.

  “I have to find Alicia.” Rory gets up. He doesn’t look at Jesse as he leaves the room.

  The gate to the kitchen garden’s open. Alicia’s sitting on the bench by the pond.

  “Hello.”

  Alicia looks up and they stare at each other. Brother and sister.

  “I read it.”

  “Right.” Absurdly, Alicia clasps her hands behind her back.

  Rory says painfully, “Do you think it’s true? That your dad, that I’m . . .”

  Alicia hesitates. “I don’t know.” But she does.

  “Rape.” The word hangs in the air. Rory sits beside Alicia. “I used to envy you. Did you know that?”

  She shakes her head.

  “You had a father.” Rory takes one of Alicia’s hands. “Why did he never say anything?”

  Her voice shakes. “You’re asking me?”

  The garden hums in the warmth. Bees working the flowers, birds dodging through the trees.

  “If it’s real, is that a good thing or a bad thing?”

  “Perhaps we should let the lawyers decide.” Pain snaps those words like twigs.

  “Lawyers?” Rory’s confused. “But isn’t this about family?”

  “That’s when you need them most.” She gets up, brushes past.

  Rory watches as Alicia tracks back toward the house.

  “Jesse,” Mack calls out.

  The solitary figure, made smaller by distance, wanders across the inner ward.

  “Hey!” Mack shouts louder, waves his arms, even whistles.

  The wind carries the sound and the girl looks back.

  Alicia, hurrying along the terrace past the library, hears it too. Mack’s covered a lot of ground by the time she sees him.

  So’s Jesse. She’s running to Mack. He stops, arms wide, wide open. And folds her in. And holds her. Just holds her.

  Unseen, Alicia watches. She’s never felt more alone in her life.

  57

  WE STOOD together outside the chapel in the keep. Here was the least destruction, and since the sack we had all slept on the floor beside my mother’s grave—Margaretta and me and the children, with their grandfather beside us.

  “Will you promise yourself to me?” Ah, I remember speaking those words.

  She gripped my fingers tight. “Yes. And will you?”

  “Yes. Handfast. For the rest of our lives.”

  Ah, memory. Search the years . . .

  There it is. The choking smell of tallow from the candle she held. I liked the smell from that day.

  “Come with me.”

  “Wherever you wish, lady.”

  “You should not call me that. In the world’s eyes I am still your servant.” But she smiled at me so fondly.

  I was enchanted. I had never before seen Margaretta happy. “We are promised now, and soon”—I waved to the altar—“Simeon will sing us a wedding mass and none shall say you are not the true lady of this keep.”

  She touched my face so lovingly. And stepped back to look in my eyes. “Bayard, you know what stands on the other side?” She meant the cavern.

  I nodded. “Rauf and I carried the Madonna there together.” Rauf. We had no wood for coffins when we buried him. But as Simeon intoned the final blessing and I went to cover Rauf’s face with a napkin, a breeze lifted a lock of his hair—that streak of silver had always marked him as different. A strange moment, as if he waved to me from somewhere far away. I had yet to tell his wife at their farmstead by the river of his death. That would be a heavy burden for her, and my duty to care for her children.

  “Is all well with you, my lord?” She must have seen the sadness in my eyes.

  My lord. It had another meaning too. This is what a wife called her husband. “Yes. All is well with me.”

  “Shall we bring Her back to the chapel?” Margaretta gestured to the wall.

  I hesitated. “There is something I must show you.”

  Perhaps Margaretta was puzzled, but when, later, we stood before the Madonna, I asked, “What do you see?”

  “She has fine new clothes.”

  I nodded. Godefroi had commissioned a velvet mantle for the Virgin, a rich, deep blue. “And?”

  “And Her face is clean.”

  “Yes.” Since Fulk’s time, soot from the lamps and incense and candles had made the faces and the hands of Christ and His Mother almost black. But now they shone, and the eyes gleamed clear blue. “Look closer.”

  Margaretta did as I asked. Then came the jolt. “Flore. This is her face. And the baby”—her hand shook hot tallow to the earth—“the Holy Infant, he, she . . .”

  I took the candle from her. “Yes. Felice might have modeled for the child.” Yet the Madonna and Her baby were old as old, older than the keep. “Matthias saw the Madonna’s likeness to the Lady Flore when the face was first cleaned. That is what I think.”

  Margaretta spoke softly, “So that is why . . .”

  “Yes. People try to destroy what frightens them.”

  Margaretta turned to me. “It was a miracle she came here. She was a miracle. And Felice is the sign to tell us that. This is not Christ’s mother; She is our mother.” Margaretta knelt before the statue, staring up into that silver face. “She should stay here, by Her pool.” Light flickered on the handprints around the Red Gate.

  Some—in the shadows—did they move?

  I took the candle and stood beside the figure of the Christ. “Tell me what you see.”

  Margaretta’s hand went to her mouth. “His face. And yours. They are the same.”
>
  It was true. Rauf had seen the likeness before I did, the night we brought the statues here.

  “What does it mean, Bayard?”

  “It means she has given Hundredfield to you and to me. My family did not deserve to hold this land, and long ago your family lost this place also.” I knelt beside her. “But we shall hold it now, you and I. And our children. The old way, the old world has gone, and we begin the new one here. Today.”

  58

  THEY WALK to the keep together, Jesse and Alicia, and this time the door is open. Alicia is angry and frightened, but she can feel it; a weight she’s carried for so long is shifting. Yet, her whole body is tender, as if she has been beaten.

  “You go first.” Jesse pushes the door wider.

  “Why?”

  “Because you should.”

  Alicia summons the mask she usually wears. Calm, polite, clear about who she is; it’s her armor. “We are going back to the chapel?”

  “If that’s okay?” Jesse’s happy to ask permission. This is inevitable, they both know it, but if she can help Alicia, she will.

  In the anteroom of the chapel, Alicia pauses. They both have flashlights. “Are you sure?”

  Jesse’s tone is helpless. “I don’t think there’s a choice.” She steps forward and her light goes to the same place. The entrance.

  “Did you know it was there?”

  Jesse shakes her head. “But when you went back to get the book”—she hesitates—“it was like being pulled by a rip tide, all the way out to sea.”

  “A rip tide?”

  “A powerful current off a beach. You don’t know it’s there until it catches you up and drags you off your feet. Sometimes you drown.”

  “But you didn’t drown.”

  “No. Not this time.” The pair stand together, looking into the void of the tunnel. “This time it carried me home.”

  “Jesse.” Alicia says her name like a breathed-out prayer.

  “Come on.” Jesse holds out her hand.

  Alicia surrenders. She takes her sister’s hand. They walk the tunnel together, the older leading the younger.

  This second time, the cavern displays its secrets without urgency: the great silver Christ, his cross of olive wood canted against the wall, and the tall, white figure with the child in her arms.

  Alicia is transfixed. Her flashlight plays over the trail of hands around the cleft in the rock. “So this is where they came from—the carvings on the door reveals.” She stares, baffled. “There’s so much I don’t understand.”

  “Neither do I. But I was told I had to return the mother.” Jesse’s had the Harrods bag all this time. She takes out what is inside. “And that my family would help to find the child that was lost. I was lost. But you brought me here, Alicia. You began this—not Rory, you. I came to Hundredfield, and you brought me to the keep.” Jesse steps forward and reaches up. The mask fits over the damaged stone of the head. “This is her face. We have given it back to her.”

  Tentatively Alicia smiles. “And what’s through there?” She points to the opening in the rock.

  “I don’t know.”

  This time, there’s no hesitation. The two bend under the archway of hands together.

  Jesse’s light plays over the water as it falls from the lip of the pool.

  “It’s red. What does that mean?”

  “I don’t know. Pollution?”

  “Is that what you really think?”

  Jesse bends forward, dips fingers into the water. “Might be.”

  “It’s the same color as the garnets on the Christ figure.”

  Jesse nods. She’s brought something else in the Harrods bag. A small bunch of flowers from Hundredfield’s garden—borage and roses, Queen Anne’s lace and sweet peas. And rosemary. She scatters them on the water and watches as the stream carries them away. Murmurs, “For remembrance.”

  Alicia asks curiously, “Why did you do that?”

  “I don’t know.” Jesse turns to face her sister. “So, what do you want to do?”

  Alicia stretches out her hand. “I think we should find Rory.”

  “That would be good.” But Jesse’s hesitant.

  “None of this is his fault. Not this time.” A trace of humor is in Alicia’s voice as she scrambles over the lip of stone, back into the tunnel.

  “He might not believe that.” Jesse’s following.

  “Overdeveloped guilt complex, that man. Odd in a doctor.”

  Jesse scoffs, “Says you. You don’t let him get away with anything.”

  Alicia stops. “I suppose you’re right.” She waits for Jesse to catch up. “Let’s go home. Shall we? I hope he’s there.”

  59

  THE QUEEN. It’s really the queen. Oh, doesn’t she look lovely. And the duke! I can’t believe it!”

  Jesse and Janet have been on the pavement across the road from St. Paul’s since early evening yesterday. Janet would have it no other way. They were both glad of their hastily purchased sleeping bags because the night was cold and quite dark. But everyone was friendly, sharing food and blankets, waving flags, singing “Rule, Britannia.”

  Almost zero sleep and an anxious, gray dawn, neighbor consulting neighbor on the footpath, offering memories of other rain-blighted royal weddings, but it had been a wonderful day so far.

  “Can you really see through that thing, Mum?” Jesse’s annoyed with herself. They should have bought two, but the periscopes were so expensive.

  “It works a treat, even if they were bandits.”

  Janet shakes her head. London! The money! Everything’s outrageous these days. But she manages to squeeze her daughter’s hand as she wields the long, ungainly tube of cardboard above their heads. Crammed between so many others all equally desperate to see the groom arrive, it’s not easy scanning the steps of the cathedral.

  But Janet is so grateful, and so happy to see the future king of England on his wedding day that she dares the gray skies above St. Paul’s to do their worst. Let it rain! Here she stands, free of the clouds of the past—free to stand beside her child sharing what Jesse had always planned. “There he is! There he is!”

  “Where?” That mighty surge of sound is made of one word: “Charles!”

  The small figure of a man, dwarfed by that immensity of stone, turns at the top of the steps and waves.

  Janet gives a satisfied sigh. “Oh, isn’t he handsome? The press are so unfair to that poor man. Charles! Charles!” Waving enthusiastically, Janet’s got her face jammed against the viewing window. “Look! He’s turning this way!” She waves again. One hand among so many.

  Jesse waves too. The actual king of England-to-be. And then she remembers. Part of her blood family has a history as long as the Windsors’. Longer, maybe. But Eva? Where did you come from? Who were you? How did you just disappear?

  Janet nudges Jesse. “You know, I heard a million people are here today. Doesn’t surprise me a bit.”

  Jesse’s jerked back to the present. “No. A million? Amazing.” She stands protectively behind her mother, trying to make a bit of space for her. Janet’s such a tiny woman. Anyone looking at them both would never think they’re mother and daughter. Big as a fridge, ridgy-didge. But the taunt from school days doesn’t hurt anymore. She likes being tall. Mack’s taller.

  “Rory’s sister? What?”

  That had been a moment. It was after Mack had found her in the inner ward.

  “Yes. It’s true. But do you want the best news?” Poor man. Stunned got nowhere near the right word.

  “There’s more?”

  Jesse’s heart had lifted, she had felt it physically. So the old saying was true. “Yes. There really is. You’re not my brother, Mack. Not full, not half, not even a bit. We are not related. Period.”

  He had snorted. “I could have told you that.”

  “Oh, really?”

  “We don’t look a bit alike.” That amiable grin.

  Jesse feels that urgent hand on her sleeve again. “Yes, Mum?
”

  “You’re not listening.” Janet’s jumping, yes, jumping up and down. “She’s here. Look!”

  There she was indeed, as the crowd surged and craned and roared. A girl in a fairy tale, getting out of a glass coach, on her way to meet her prince.

  “Oh! The dress, look at the dress.”

  Jesse craned and angled with the rest of them. She wanted to see it. Something released in her heart. She was enjoying herself. Actually, really enjoying herself. Nothing would ever surprise her again, but fairy tales? What was all that about?

  The small black-and-white TV brings the wedding into the kitchen at Hundredfield. Panning shots of the crowds in the cathedral, then a high point of view as the groom and his brothers walk into position at the high altar.

  There’s a tight shot as Andrew sneaks a look toward the West Door and nods to Charles just as the picture goes to snow.

  “No!” Alicia hurries to the dresser, fiddles with the rabbit ears. The picture settles. She edges back to the table, eyes fixed on every flicker.

  “Hello. I’d forgotten it was today.”

  Alicia startles. “Rory! How could you forget a thing like this?”

  He’s standing just inside the back door. She didn’t hear him come down the stairs.

  Surprised, she’s uncomfortable. So is he. “Come in. I can turn it off, if you like. I mean, what’s another wedding? Seen one, seen—”

  “—them all.” He nods. “Yes. But why don’t we watch it together? We can pass it on to the grandchildren.”

  Something complex passes across Alicia’s face. “Yes. Yes, please stay. That would be nice.”

  With all the movement on the screen, all the noise, and Richard Burton’s voice-over of the action, it’s still curiously quiet in the kitchen at Hundredfield as Rory joins her at the table.

  “Lovely girl, if a bit young.” Rory’s doing his best. He thinks Alicia doesn’t notice as he keeps glancing at her face.