Cast the First Stone: A stunning wartime story

by Angela Arney

  An extra loud shower of hail against the windows caused Liana to pause for a moment and look out. The wide lawns sloping down to the lake and the Palladian bridge which crossed the far end of the water were almost obliterated by the freezing sleet.

  Suddenly her mind reeled and time slipped, plunging Liana backwards. It was Italy, not England, and the cold rain obliterating the landscape was sweeping inland in torrents from the sea, just as it had on the day they had buried Eleanora – she and Raul. Sometimes it seemed to Liana that it had all happened a lifetime ago. Someone else’s lifetime, not her own. But then suddenly, without any warning, the painful memories would return sharper and more clear cut than ever. They burned into her now, cleaving her in two. She bent double, face buried in her hands. Was it possible to die from remembered pain? She answered herself: no, of course not. A memory was not a physical thing, it was only in the mind. But if that was so, why did it hurt so much? Why did it feel so real?

  It was no good, she could not deny the memories. Unreasoning desolation flooded through her. Raul, darling Raul. I loved you then and I love you now. I’ll never stop loving you, never, never, never.

  Bleak despair swept over her. Liana stopped fighting and gave in to it, leaning her cheek against the cold window pane and welcoming the pain now with open arms. Oh, the relief, the exquisite relief just to let go, to let her guard down for a few moments, letting a little of the poisonous deceit seep out.

  Lady Margaret found her. She was slumped in the window seat, blue with cold, tears pouring down her cheeks. ‘Come, my dear,’ she said tenderly, wrapping her arms around her.

  She wanted to help and to weep with her, too, so dark and bitter were Liana’s tears. But she had too much good sense to probe into such deep grief. Instead she gently but firmly led Liana towards the warmth of the kitchen.

  *

  Much later Liana realized that the kitchen had proved to be her salvation in more ways than one. For there in the warmth she suddenly remembered the stufa at the castello – how efficient it was in spite of its great age, and how little wood it used. That night she sat up late in the library, planning. The project claiming her attention, having topmost priority now, was ‘a warm Broadacres’ – or at least some of it – campaign. The English might be content to exist in near arctic conditions but she was not. The kitchen range had given her an idea, and with painstaking efficiency Liana transformed that idea into a concrete plan. The following day she summoned Bruno. If hard work and ambition were to be the only balm against unwelcome memories, then, Liana reasoned, why shouldn’t her mind be engaged in bringing a little comfort into all their lives?

  Bruno came into her office. He stood politely just inside the door, very conscious of his mucky farm clothes. ‘Yes, my Lady.’

  Liana looked up, smiling. The tears of yesterday were gone now, as if by magic. In their place was her usual serenely beautiful expression. Bruno marvelled at the mercurial change of mood. She was a different woman from the one he had seen distraught and weeping in the kitchen. But the serenity was a mask donned with difficulty. Only Liana knew the very special dedication it took to confront her sorrow then put it away and pretend to the world at large that she was who they thought her to be.

  ‘Bruno, I understand there is a forge at Elverton.’

  ‘Yes, there is. But nothing on the farm needs repairing.’ Bruno was puzzled.

  ‘It’s not mending I have in mind, Bruno,’ said Liana. ‘It’s making. Can you take me there now?’

  ‘But I’ve only got the farm lorry. You can’t ride in that.’ Bruno was horrified. He usually borrowed the doctor’s Austin when Lady Margaret or Liana wanted to go anywhere, which was not often. The yellow Rolls Royce belonging to the Hamilton-Howards had been mothballed for the duration of the war, along with most other civilians’ cars.

  ‘Why not the lorry?’ Liana laughed outright in genuine amusement at his expression. ‘Bruno, please do not make such a disapproving face. As long as I don’t have to walk all the way to Elverton, I don’t care what I go in.’

  As usual, once she had made up her mind, Liana left no stone unturned in order to achieve her goal. The goal now was warmth. She had conceived a plan which she was sure would transform a small part of Broadacres into a warm home instead of the enormous refrigerator it now resembled.

  The long hours in the library the previous evening paid off handsomely. Her plans fell into place with lightning speed. She presented drawings and figures to the blacksmith and his mate as if she had meticulously worked them all out months in advance and hid a satisfied smile as she watched the heads of the two men poring over her plans. Little did they know she had sat up half the night, hastily scribbling her ideas on large pieces of paper, before carefully making the drawings and the detailed plans. Fred Blaker and his mate at Elverton Forge, had been making farm machinery and charcoal kilns for more years than they cared to remember, so the log-burning stoves Liana had outlined presented no particular difficulties. And once she had explained in greater detail exactly what she had in mind, it seemed simplicity itself.

  ‘No problem at all, Your Ladyship,’ said Fred, scratching his head and wishing he had thought of the idea himself.

  ‘I know, of course, that to begin with we shall need to keep the stoves fairly small in size and number,’ Liana said, ‘because of the shortage of metal. But as soon as the war is over, we will make larger ones for the downstairs of the house and then move the small ones up to the rest of the bedrooms. After the war we’ll aim to have the whole house warm, and ventilation will be no problem because every room in the house, even the bathrooms, has a fireplace. We’ll connect the flues for the stoves up into the existing chimneys.’

  ‘My word, Your Ladyship,’ said Fred admiringly, ‘that’s real clever. You think of everything.’

  The news soon got around the village. Lady Liana was at it again. She was having heating installed in the Big House. It was Mary Pragnell, of course, who spread the news.

  ‘Fred Blaker, over at Elverton, he have got orders to make five stoves,’ she said in her broad Hampshire accent, ‘one for the breakfast room, one for the Arcadian room and three others for the bedrooms. Imagine that, warm bedrooms! I’m not sure that’s healthy myself, but there you are, that’s what she wants.’

  There were others who shared her disapproval on that aspect. Heated bedrooms, who ever heard of such a thing! It was natural and healthy to scrape the ice from the inside of the windows in winter. But, of course, it was because Lady Liana was foreign. The English, a hardy race, thrived in cold bedrooms. The villagers were surprised that Lady Margaret had agreed to such a revolutionary idea, little knowing that she could hardly wait for a stove to be installed in her bedroom!

  But in the evenings, over the bar of the Mayfly, it was generally agreed that Lady Liana might be foreign but she had her head screwed on the right way. Log-burning stoves, not coal. Why use coal, when everyone knew there were enough logs lying unused on the Broadacres estate to keep five stoves going for several years.

  *

  Clara Maltravers invited herself over to Broadacres. Village gossip concerning the log stoves inevitably spread across the Itchen Valley and reached her ears. Eventually, as Lady Margaret showed no sign of inviting her, curiosity got the better of her and she manufactured an excuse to come over. She sat now, luxuriating in the warmth of the gold and white Arcadian room, drinking tea and eating one of Meg’s feathery light scones.

  ‘Well, my dear, your daughter-in-law might be foreign but I must admit she has certainly proved to be something of an asset, surprising though indeed that is! A warm room, and in December. I must ask Fred Blaker at the forge to make me one of these log-burning stoves. I could certainly do with it. The wretched coal ration is used up in no time at all.’ She shivered, thinking of the cold Victorian mausoleum of a house waiting for her on the other side of the valley.

  ‘You can put in an order with me if you wish – half the cost payable in advance: Mr Porter, the
bank manager, has told Liana to insist on that but I suppose I might be able to persuade her to give you priority treatment.’

  ‘Pardon?’ Clara Maltravers’s plummy voice ricocheted off the white carved panelling behind her. ‘Did I hear you correctly? Put an order in with you?’

  ‘Yes.’ Margaret tried not to sound too smug, but it was not easy. It was not often she had Clara Maltravers at a disadvantage. ‘Liana designed the stoves, and after advice we have put the design up for a patent application and have formed a company for manufacturing them. Elver Forge Industries it’s called. Our emblem is a baby eel – that was my idea. It will be stamped on each stove.’

  ‘You, going into industry?’ Mrs Maltravers was scandalized. ‘Farming is one thing, it goes with our class, but industry!’ She gave a delicate shudder. ‘Why, it’s unheard of! Industry is for new money, not for aristocracy.’

  ‘Yes, into industry and money,’ snapped Margaret, annoyed at Clara’s condescending attitude. ‘And goodness knows we could do with the money! As Liana says, farming is an industry, too – a different kind of industry, and one we so-called “gentleman farmers” have never been particularly successful at getting organized although here at Broadacres things are beginning to improve, thanks again to Liana; she has so many ideas. But to get back to your stove, I must tell you the order book is already full. It has been quite amazing. As soon as people hear about them, they want one, just like you. But, of course, Fred Blaker can’t make as many as needed because of all the shortages although he’s busy collecting every suitable piece of scrap metal he can lay his hands on. So, my dear Clara, if you do seriously want one, then please let me know as soon as possible and I’ll see what I can do for you. Of course, the moment the war is over and the men come back, we shall be able to take on more labour and Fred will expand the forge. Unfortunately until then we shall have to limit the output. Liana says . . .’

  ‘Talking of Liana, where is she?’ interrupted Mrs Maltravers. She felt put out and rather huffy. She was used to bullying Margaret, not being put down! It was difficult coping with this new, confident woman, and slightly worrying. She glanced at her reflection in the mirror opposite and patted the sculptured waves of her tinted hair: rigidly perfect, she noted with relief. Thank God. The sight boosted her deflated morale. Margaret looked as if she had come straight from the stables as usual, which indeed she had. Iron grey hair straggling more untidily than ever, Clara noticed disdainfully, and, of course, wrinkled stockings and low-heeled shoes which made the fashion-conscious Clara shudder but at the same time gave her a smug satisfaction. She warmed to her theme. ‘I’ve only seen Liana once – at the harvest festival service in Longford Parish Church.’ Clara was a regular churchgoer and never lost an opportunity to bully the vicar mercilessly. ‘As Liana is the new countess,’ she now said archly, ‘I do think it imperative that she should be seen in the Wessex family pew every Sunday. You should insist that she attends. Remind her that it is her duty.’

  ‘Liana will come, if and when, she wishes,’ replied Margaret with an abrupt snort of laughter. The idea of anyone insisting Liana did anything was ludicrous.

  ‘Well, where is she now? Shouldn’t she be taking tea with us?’

  Margaret sighed. Clara was beginning to sound querulous. She had fixed ideas concerning social etiquette, her small world being rigorously bound by it. Margaret, who had always found the endless round of coffee mornings, tea parties and minor charity works petty and irritating, had opted out of them after the death of the earl and had made no effort to introduce Liana to the meaningless social merry-go-round of county society although she did intend to take her to London later in the year. She knew what they all said – a woman of her social standing should be active in the county – but she did not care and knew Liana was much too busy with the estate to care either. And never in a million years could she imagine Liana having anything in common with women like Clara Maltravers.

  ‘Liana is too busy. She is working. The library in the Lower Cloisters has been converted into an office. It is the most convenient place to store all the books and ledgers, and since the estate telephone has been installed she has everything she needs to work efficiently.’

  Realizing she was not going to bludgeon Margaret into summoning Liana, Clara changed the subject. ‘Are you going to the Twentieth Ball in aid of Queen Charlotte’s? It’s at Grosvenor House on December the sixteenth this year. I assume you have been allocated tickets as usual. If you are not going, perhaps you might like to let Sir Funtingdon and his wife have your tickets. I told them you would. They have been left off the list.’

  ‘I was thinking of going and taking Liana.’

  ‘But you never go. You always just make a donation.’

  ‘There is a first time for everything,’ said Margaret tartly, unconsciously echoing Liana. She rose to show that the tea session was over and accompanied a very put-out Clara Maltravers into the cavernous marble entrance hall of Broadacres.

  ‘Being pregnant will pose a dreadful problem for Lady Liana,’ sniffed Clara, determined to put a dampener on Margaret’s plans. ‘She’ll never have enough coupons to get an evening dress. I would offer to help, but I’ve already used up my coupons on my own dress. I’ve ordered it from Harvey Nichols.’

  ‘We shall manage,’ replied Margaret, anxious to get rid of Clara. She had few illusions about the retrospective meaningless offer, knowing very well that Clara would not part with clothing coupons unless she were held at gunpoint. And she saw no point in telling Clara that the problem had already been resolved with spectacular results. Let her find that out on the night of the ball, then her supercilious expression would soon disappear! The thought filled Margaret with unaccustomed glee, tinged with not a little vindictiveness, and she bade Clara an unusually warm farewell.

  *

  On 16 December 1944 Bruno waited for Lady Margaret and Lady Liana at Winchester railway station; they were due in on the night train from Waterloo. The station was dim, the lights heavily shaded: the blackout was still in operation but the waiting room was cheerful with paper chains strung across the ceiling and a small Christmas tree, lit up with fairy-lights, standing in the corner. Bruno waited and wondered, as did the rest of the staff at Broadacres, how the two women had fared. It had been Liana’s introduction to high society.

  When the train steamed in, a door from one of the darkened carriages opened and for a moment the light from inside illuminated his two favourite women, next to Meg, of course. Bruno had never seen Lady Margaret brimming with such good spirits or dressed so fashionably. Why, the old girl looked quite presentable. Lady Liana, however, was another matter altogether. She looked like a princess straight from the pages of a Grimm’s fairy-tale. If her picture isn’t plastered all over the front page of tomorrow’s Daily Express I’ll eat my hat, he thought proudly.

  The evening had been an unqualified success, far exceeding Margaret’s hopes and aspirations. Both women’s dresses had earned them critical acclaim, a fact which pleased Margaret all the more because they had spent very little money. Her own dress was an old ball gown which had long languished unused in a cupboard. With Dolly’s skilful help it had been remodelled into the latest fashion. Liana had insisted on doing her hair, and for once it was slightly waved in the front and drawn back into a shining french pleat at the back instead of the usual straggly bun. With her pearl drop earrings, and three-strand pearl choker, she looked every inch the dowager countess.

  Liana looked exquisite, so delicately beautiful that Bruno’s heart almost burst with pride as he tucked both women up comfortably with the travel rug. Like everyone else at Broadacres, he felt possessive and protective towards Liana. She had brought something special into their lives, and was treasured accordingly. What a woman – clever, hardworking, glamorous. Bruno could not take his eyes off her.

  He was not the only man unable to take his eyes off Liana that evening. The new Countess of Wessex had captivated every man at the ball, including Winston Churc
hill who had insisted she and Lady Margaret sit at his table. Even now, as Liana walked in front of Margaret up the wide stone steps and into the marble entrance hall of Broadacres, Margaret found it difficult to believe that the evening had been so wonderful.

  If she had gone with anyone but Liana, Margaret knew she would have passed the time as she usually did on such occasions, stuck at the back of the room, hating every moment and counting the minutes to when she could make her escape. Although she had been determined to launch Liana into society, Margaret had never expected to enjoy it. But in her anxiety to protect her foreign daughter-in-law, her usual tongued-tied shyness had disappeared and she had found herself animatedly discussing a wide variety of subjects. Not that she need have worried for Liana, because she proved that she was more than capable of holding her own. And when the conversation switched to a topic of which she knew nothing, she charmingly acknowledged her ignorance, thus winning the hearts of those around her.

  It was Liana’s dress, however, that initially caused all heads to turn. Out of the corner of her eye Margaret had seen Clara Maltravers staring open-mouthed, and concealed a smile. By the end of the evening whispers had given rise to a rumour which in turn had become accepted as fact: there was a wonderful new designer in London, a Jewish refugee, a personal find of the countess’s, whose clothes were exclusive and wildly expensive.

  In fact Liana herself had created the dress. It was fashioned from a spare gold brocade curtain found in one of the store rooms. Liana had drawn the design and Dolly had put her heart into it, making a dress that was daring, elegant and eye-catching. A halter-neck top supported her full breasts, and was cut low enough to be tantalizing but remained just high enough to be decent. To cover her pregnancy the brocade fell straight from her bust into a flaring A line, swirling into a shimmering train at the back. With it she wore the diamond and amethyst jewellery brought with her from Italy. The sparkling jewels set in mellow old gold suited her Nefertiti-like beauty, showing off her flawless olive complexion. She stood out, a cool exotic lily, making the bevy of English roses look slightly overblown in comparison.