Emeralds & Ashes

by Leila Rasheed

Rebecca was speechless for a moment. She took in the girl’s appearance almost unconsciously. She wasn’t quality; that much was clear from her hat and, after a moment’s observation, from a thousand other little details, not merely in her dress but in her appearance. Her wide, terrified blue eyes, her cheap gloves, and the way she stood, like someone more used to being in a still-room than in a drawing room, all proclaimed that she was no official visitor.

  “A ghost!” Martha trembled. “An apparition!”

  “Nonsense,” said Rebecca sharply. She realized that she recognized the intruder: she was one of the innkeeper’s daughters, at the Averley Arms. She had seen her often enough, running errands around the village, though she did not know her name. “What are you doing here?” she said, making an effort to keep her voice calm and soothing. “And how—how did you get in?”

  “I’m here to see the family.” The girl’s reply was strong and clear. “I found a window open, and I’m here to see them, face to face.”

  “She’s come to kill us all in our beds—” Martha began.

  “Martha, please!” Rebecca took a deep breath. Again she spoke gently, putting her hand out to the girl. “Come downstairs, for heaven’s sake. You can’t see the family, not now. The earl is dead, didn’t you know? The funeral is today. If you’re found here, there’ll be the most awful trouble.”

  “The earl is dead, she says!” The girl gave a harsh laugh. “Do you think I care? I wish he’d died before this war ever started!”

  “Hush, for heaven’s sake!” Rebecca was horrified, and the thought crossed her mind that the girl might be insane. She crossed to the girl, took her arm gently, and tried to steer her toward the door. “Come away—have you no sympathy for poor Lady Georgiana? And the countess?”

  “Haven’t they any for me? At least they’ve a body.” The girl shook her off, her voice trembling. “I’ve nothing to bury—not even any right to grieve. No one knows, oh, no one knows how much we loved each other.”

  The words came out as if wrung from her, and Rebecca’s heart twisted in sympathy. The girl was mad, she realized—mad with grief. Clearly, she had lost someone close to her. Perhaps not a husband; perhaps they hadn’t even been engaged. There were tragedies like this every day, she knew. She put an arm around the girl’s shoulders. “My dear,” she said softly. “I am so sorry for your loss. Wouldn’t it be better to come downstairs with me and compose yourself? Then you can speak your piece to the family clearly, without breaking down.”

  The girl hesitated, and Rebecca was sure that her childish trickery would never work. But she had underestimated how tired the girl was, she realized. She remembered that exhaustion herself, from when her father had died—days of not sleeping, of raging, until she was so sore at heart that she longed for anyone to put an arm round her and tell her it was all right, that she could stop grieving without letting him down. The girl shuddered and relaxed against her arm. Rebecca found herself almost carrying her to the servants’ stairs. As she passed Annie, she turned and whispered fiercely, “Get the mess cleared up; get this room to rights. And don’t breathe a word of this to anyone, you two!”

  She hoped, as she steered the girl from the room, that she could rely on Annie and Martha to hold their tongues. It seemed unlikely, but she had other things to do. The girl had to be gotten downstairs before the family arrived, at all costs.

  Just as they reached the door of the drawing room, Thomas came in. He started in astonishment as he saw them. “Rebecca?” He looked both angry and anxious. “Who on earth is this woman? Get her out of here! The first motorcars are coming up the drive!”

  “Don’t you order me about!” The girl roused herself at his words. “If my James was here as he used to be, he would never have stood for it.”

  James! Rebecca remembered the footman she had never met, who had left the day she arrived. By the stricken look on Thomas’s face, she knew that he did too.

  To her relief, he changed his tone at once. “I’m sorry, miss. I didn’t know who you were. But if you come downstairs with me and Miss Freeman, we’ll see you have everything you need…”

  Rebecca kept walking the girl toward the baize door, and Thomas came to flank the girl on her other side. Distantly, she heard the noise of people entering through the front door: clear, upper-class voices. She hastened her pace, her heartbeat quickening. They were at the baize door, Thomas still talking calmly, politely. The door was open, and they were through. But the sound of it closing behind them made the girl start. She turned and began trying to fight her way upstairs again. Rebecca had all she could do to stop her from pushing her way back through. Luckily, Thomas was just behind her. Together they managed to get her down into the servants’ quarters, but not without Rebecca’s face being covered in scratches and her cap knocked sideways. Thomas managed to get the girl’s arms behind her back, and steered her toward the housekeeper’s room.

  “Can you get my key from the hook and unlock it?” he gasped. Then, to the girl: “Gently, miss, I don’t want to hurt you!” Rebecca hastily slipped the key from the nail on the wall and unlocked the housekeeper’s door. Thomas pushed the girl in, and Rebecca slammed the door shut behind the three of them.

  “I can’t leave Annie and Martha up there—they’ll never manage.” Thomas was out of breath, the girl still struggling.

  “I’ll stay with her—you lock us in,” Rebecca answered.

  “Right—here goes.” Thomas pushed the girl toward the housekeeper’s chair, with a brief “Sorry, miss,” and caught the key as Rebecca tossed it to him. He darted out of the door before the girl could turn around, and slammed it behind him. Rebecca heard the door lock. The girl spun to face her, and Rebecca took a step backward, thinking for the first time of the danger she might be in. But the girl simply put her hands to her face, began sobbing heavily, and collapsed into a chair. It seemed she was defeated.

  Rebecca stood, catching her breath. She watched, full of pity, as the girl sobbed. This was such a tragedy; no wonder the poor girl was in such a state. She had never met James, but she had helped the others put up parcels for him and had seen his cheerful, short letters pinned up in the kitchen. This girl had clearly loved him very much.

  “What’s your name, dear?” she said, once the sobs had begun to die down.

  “Jenny. It was going to be Jenny Carter. He promised me that.”

  “I’m sure he did,” Rebecca said gently. She knew how hard it was—a love affair still young, not told to the parents yet. Where did that leave poor Jenny, with no right to weep at the funeral? “I am so sorry for your loss,” she said. “But how can it be the family’s fault?”

  Jenny looked up, fierce and resentful. “They encouraged him! He was so cock-a-hoop at the earl shaking his hand! I told him to be careful, but he said he’d do anything for a master like that.” Her voice shook with passion. “It isn’t f-fair. The earl gets a grand funeral; my James gets n-nothing. He’s missing in action. He’d never have gone if it wasn’t for the earl egging him on. He cared for me so much.” The girl began sobbing, softly and hopelessly. “And he’s gone, he’s gone.”

  Wordlessly, Rebecca went to the girl and knelt before her, taking her hands in her own, pressing them kindly. She sensed that the girl simply needed to talk to someone, anyone. She listened as the girl cried and told her everything—how they had courted, how he had promised to marry her as soon as he got leave, how she hadn’t wanted him to go but he’d been so set on the idea of being a hero, living up to the ideal…and now there was nothing, not even a body to bury. Rebecca listened and felt like weeping herself.

  “Do you have something to remember him by?” she asked finally, thinking of James’s few possessions that he had left behind, and wondering if she could give Jenny something to keep.

  Jenny looked into Rebecca’s eyes. She gave a brief, bleak smile. “Oh yes,” she said. “That’s the trouble.”

  It took Rebecca a moment to understand what she meant. Then—with a shock of sympathy�
�she understood. No wonder the poor girl was so desperate. What was she to say? I’m sorry sounded callous—what was there to regret in a baby born out of love? But what was there to celebrate in a baby born into shame and poverty, with a father dead before he knew of its existence?

  “Perhaps it may not be so bad,” she said in the end. “Have you spoken to his parents?”

  “No, nor to my own. I know what they’ll say.”

  “They may not. It may not be as you fear.” Rebecca looked up into her face, wanting so much to give comfort. “His parents will be grieving; think what it could mean to them to have a grandchild. And your parents…well.” She thought of her father, his stern, kind love. “My father would have been angry, but my understood in the end.”

  Jenny did not answer. Rebecca was silent, unable to think of another thing to say that might help. She had tried to be comforting, but the fact was, Palesbury was a small town. Not all parents were as loving as hers. Jenny would be thought of as ruined, and that would make it hard for her to find work, impossible for her to find a husband to care for another man’s child…The future seemed bleak.

  After what seemed like a long time, there was a knock at the door, and Rebecca heard a key turning in the lock. She got up and met Thomas at the door. Jenny did not move.

  “Is everything all right?” Thomas greeted her in a whisper.

  Rebecca nodded. His eyes searched her face, full of warm concern.

  “I should never have left you here with her in this violent state,” he said in the same low voice. “She could have attacked you or anything. I didn’t think. I’m a fool.”

  “There was nothing else to do, and I was quite safe.”

  “Still, it was wrong of me. I’ll never do it again.”

  “She is so much better now; I don’t think she would ever have harmed anyone,” Rebecca said quickly, anxious to defend Jenny.

  Thomas looked over at Jenny. She had stood up while they were talking, and she was now standing at the window, her back to them, looking out through the diamond paned windows.

  “I’m very sorry, miss, for your loss,” Thomas said gently. “James gone—I can hardly believe it. I must go up again, but I had to come and pay my condolences.” He went on, his voice trembling. “We all respected James so much. He was like an older brother to me.”

  Jenny nodded distantly, still looking out of the window. Rebecca crossed the room so she could see what she was looking at. Framed in the diamond pane was a corner of the drive, and they could see the earl’s motorcar. Lady Georgiana was just getting out of the car, leaning on Master Templeton’s arm. Rebecca was too far away to see his face, but there was something about the tender, attentive way he bent over her that made Rebecca feel as if her heart were a violin, and that a string—a minor string, but still one that had been lovingly tuned—had just snapped.

  Jenny turned away from the window. In her face was nothing but weariness and resignation. “You needn’t worry. I won’t make a scene. I know you are right and it would be foolish,” she said. “I’ll go home, and perhaps…perhaps it won’t be as bad as I fear.”

  She went toward the door. Thomas stepped aside to let her pass. Rebecca followed, still worried about her. But Jenny seemed genuinely composed. She stopped at the kitchen to say, “You have been very kind, I thank you both.”

  Rebecca followed and saw her out of the back door. As she stood on the step, she whispered to Jenny, “I know Lady Georgiana will help you out if she knows the truth. She’s kindness itself.”

  Jenny looked up at her. “She knows what it is to love. I see that,” she answered quietly. “I suppose they are human after all.”

  Rebecca watched her walking away. Her heart felt twisted inside her, with pity for Jenny and pain at the knowledge that Master Templeton loved Lady Georgiana—even if her mistress did not know it.

  She sighed. Turning back into the corridor, she was startled to see Thomas still standing there, waiting for her.

  “I think she means it, sir,” she said. “She won’t make any trouble.”

  “I believe you.” He hesitated. The sunlight came through the kitchen window and glinted on his dark gold hair. “I want to thank you, Rebecca. If it were not for your quick, clearheaded actions, this could have been a very unpleasant scene.”

  Rebecca blushed with surprise at the praise. “I was only doing my job, sir.”

  “You did it well. I’m grateful—and I’m sorry about what I said about parlormaids. You’ve proved me wrong.”

  He smiled at her. It astonished Rebecca. She had never seen him smile before, not like this. It lit up his eyes; they were the exact same color as a summer sky. It was a color she could not forget as she went about her duties for the rest of the day, and at night when she lay down to sleep, she found the last thing she was thinking of was his smile.

  Oxford

  Ada sat, silent, with eyes that longed to weep, on the train as it made its way down the country toward Oxford. Her gaze was fixed on the window, and on her own reflection, fragile and ghostly, in the glass. Her back was as straight as she had learned to carry it since the nursery, and she swayed back and forth with the motion of the train, her wide-brimmed hat like the head of a flower on a tall, slender stalk. She longed to lean her aching head against the cool glass of the window. But well-bred women did not do that, and besides, she was not alone. In front of her sat two men, one in civvies and one in uniform. She guessed they were colleagues, one perhaps on leave. They had a newspaper; she caught snatches of their conversation.

  “…say it was a terrible thing, people killed in Great Yarmouth.”

  “We’re not safe even here.…”

  On the front page of the newspaper was an image of something Ada had seen only once or twice before the war: a zeppelin. The dark, smudged shape was like a stain on the paper; there was something ominous about it. It was strange that something so vast could move so silently, invisible among the clouds of night. Her eyes kept returning to the image. It was like a pit whose depths she could not see.

  The train swayed and the clack-clack of the wheels on the track beat at her mind. She had always enjoyed the rhythm of the train, but now, through her pounding headache, it felt like torture. She had had a headache for days; she always did when she had been crying.

  I must compose myself, she told herself. I am going back to start Hilary term. I must concentrate. I must remember to smile.

  But she knew that Oxford would never be the same again, not after what had happened.

  After Georgiana had left Ada at Oxford before their father’s funeral, Ada had spent the whole night packing, getting her books in order. Then, so early in the morning that it was still dark, she had set off down the street, exhausted, carrying her case, to catch the first train to Somerton. The trees overhead were invisible, but whispered softly as she passed the Thames. The moon was bright and shone down on the cobblestones and on the water. And then she saw him—first by the light of his cheroot, just as she had that day so long ago when they had first met. She knew him by his shadow, by the way he moved. He was walking across the bridge toward her.

  She quickened her step, and climbed onto the bridge where he was standing. He tossed his cheroot aside as soon as he saw her. “Ada, darling. I heard the news yesterday—a rumor in India House. I am so sorry.” He wrapped his arms around her and stroked her hair.

  “Thank you…yes, a terrible shock.” Ada hardly knew what she was saying. She knew she could be seen at any moment by a don out for a moonlit stroll, but somehow she no longer cared. “We never imagined…we thought he would face no danger. It does not feel real.”

  “It’s the most awful thing.” Ravi’s voice expressed everything that his words could not. He took her case from her. “Come, let’s go to my rooms. This place is not private.”

  Ada followed him, too tired to think about the danger of being seen. He was talking as they went, telling her how as soon as he’d realized that the rumors of a visiting advisor being kill
ed in action by a sniper’s bullet must refer to the Earl of Westlake, he had come straight to Oxford.

  “I couldn’t bear the thought of you facing this alone,” he said, pausing before a tall town house. “It’s not much,” he added, apologetically. “I took the first thing I could find.”

  They went up the narrow, steep stairs, and he let her into his room. Ada looked around. This was the closest she had ever been to him, the most intimate glimpse of his life: his razor on the washstand, his shirt hanging in the wardrobe, and it somehow made her want to cry. She wanted so much to know him with such intimacy like this, every day. But now…how could she go to India, with Somerton reeling from the blow of her father’s death?

  “Don’t light the gas,” she said quietly. “Just open the curtains so we can see the dawn.”

  He obeyed. The pale dawn light flooded in.

  “Ada,” he said, with such deep warmth, and moved toward her. She put out a hand to forestall him, resting it on his broad chest.

  “Ravi, I—”

  “Please, I know your heart must be full. Don’t feel that you have to speak unless you wish to.” He moved her hand gently, and stepped closer. She was close enough to lean her head on his chest; she could smell his sandalwood scent.

  “I simply cannot understand it,” she said. “He was adamant that he would face no danger.”

  “The word in army circles is that he was touring the battlefield, looking for improvements that could be made to the trenches. He wanted to do something for the men, to make their lives easier.”

  “My poor father.” Her voice broke. “How like him to think of others. Oh, I must go back to Somerton.” She turned away, but he followed her.

  “You look exhausted,” he said. “Rest for a moment, please.”

  She longed to simply sink into his arms. But it would not be fair. She had to say it, and she did, in a rush. “You must know this means we must postpone any plans—”

  “Of course you will not marry until you have properly mourned your father.”