The Golden Cup

by Marcia Willett

  Smiling to herself, she went to get her coat.

  Bruno observed their meeting with a sardonic watchfulness born of experience. He was not taken in by the bright smiles, the friendly cries of greeting, or the embrace that was carefully choreographed so that neither woman actually kissed the other.

  ‘Zoë.’ Emma assumed a look of caring concern. ‘What a surprise! Is all well with you?’

  She managed to imply that, from her quick assessment, Zoë wasn’t looking at her best; she even patted her arm encouragingly. Instinctively, Zoë shrank from the gesture, wrapping her thin arms round herself as though she were feeling cold. She had retaliation at hand, however, in the form of Emma’s pashmina. She reached for it, giving it a little flap – as though Emma were a bull and she a matador – before pulling it round her narrow shoulders.

  ‘I’m fine, darling,’ she said, stretching her lips in the brief imitation of a smile, ‘except that I always forget how cold it is here. Bruno’s given me this lovely shawl. Isn’t that sweet of him?’

  It didn’t need the accusation in Emma’s eyes nor the triumph in Zoë’s to realize that he’d made a gaffe.

  ‘Not given,’ he said calmly. ‘Merely lent. I can’t think why you never wear enough clothes, Zoë.’

  Emma seized upon this remark gleefully, though still seething inwardly at Bruno’s insensitivity.

  ‘Mutt used to say that once a woman got to a certain age the more that was left to the imagination the better,’ she observed, allowing her glance to linger pointedly on Zoë’s short skirt and naked neck.

  ‘And you’d be absolutely right to take her advice, darling,’ said Zoë, taking out a cigarette and leaning towards Bruno for a light. She caught his warning eye and pulled herself together: she couldn’t afford to push her luck too far. ‘Speaking of Mutt, though, I am so sorry.’

  She sounded so genuine that Emma swallowed, torn between a desire for revenge and the opportunity to maintain an air of dignified grief. Bruno brought her some coffee and gave her a tiny wink, implying that he and Emma were on the same side whilst Zoë was merely an irritant that must be endured from time to time, and she relaxed, remembering her yoga classes, taking a few deep breaths. Bruno passed Zoë her coffee and wished that he hadn’t given up smoking, wondering why she was always less abrasive, more vulnerable, when they were alone together and if any other people ever saw that side of her.

  He’d discovered that there were a few financial difficulties regarding the new flat – some new furnishings and the matter of a deposit, though the usual three months’ rent in advance had been waived – and he’d promised to help her out. Now, he saw that this subject might remind her to behave herself and he poured himself some coffee, feeling slightly relieved at this opportunity.

  ‘Zoë’s moving next week,’ he told Emma, sitting down at the end of the long table. ‘It sounds rather fun. She’s going to be living in the same house as the artist Evelyn Bose. She’s moving into her basement flat on Sunday.’

  At the news that Zoë would be gone before the funeral Emma visibly brightened. She sat down at Bruno’s right hand.

  ‘What fun,’ she said, deciding to be generous. ‘Lots of parties, I expect.’

  Zoë accepted the olive branch, perching on the chair opposite, blowing her smoke sideways.

  ‘It’s a bit of a break,’ she admitted. ‘You won’t believe it but she still exhibits. Last year she had a show …’

  Bruno sat back in his chair and sighed with relief. Whilst he listened to Zoë he was aware of Emma beside him, and remembered Mousie’s warning, yet he simply could not see how the subject was to be broached: he reviewed and rejected every remotely possible opening with horror. He got up at one point, to let Nellie in from her morning potter in the valley, and spent some moments in the kitchen with her, soothed as usual by her undemanding affection. Suddenly, he was overcome by a keen desire to be working; to be in that other, far more satisfying world of the imagination, creating his own scenes and dramas.

  ‘The fact is,’ he told Nellie, ‘I’m simply no bloody good at real life.’

  She fawned upon him, tail wagging, tongue lolling happily, so that he laughed too, comforted as usual, and went back to the women.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  Dan Crosby parked his car in the old quarry, reached for his small briefcase and climbed out. He glanced at the other three cars, trying to remember whether they were the same ones he’d seen last weekend and hoping that the girl might be around. He told himself that it was unlikely on a Thursday afternoon, that she’d almost certainly be at work, but he’d been unable to resist another trip to Paradise.

  He smiled to himself: Paradise. As he walked away from the car, crossing the narrow bridge, he felt that the name was entirely appropriate. He hadn’t looked directly at the row of cottages, in case it seemed as if he were prying in through their windows, but he did take a moment to stare across at the strange house perched on the cliff with its outflung window. It must be pretty wild up there with an Atlantic gale blowing – but impressive too.

  He passed on up the lane and paused at the field gate; the donkeys watched him consideringly for a moment whilst he called softly to them, clicking his fingers encouragingly. They came towards him with their peculiar head-dipping amble and he pulled their long ears and rubbed their soft noses, remembering how the girl had talked to them and fed them and how he’d felt such a strong sense of empathy with her, even at such a distance.

  ‘I haven’t got anything for you,’ he told them – but they stood patiently anyway, glad of the company.

  Presently he left them, walking on up the lane and through the gateway, his heart jumping a little nervously now as he braced himself for another meeting with the small woman with the keen eyes and sweet smile. He’d prepared a little opening gambit – that his holiday was nearly over and that he couldn’t go back without one more visit – and he held the small briefcase a little tighter under one arm as he knocked on the door, ready for another rejection.

  He found himself confronting someone quite different: a pretty, friendly woman with fair hair tucked behind her ears, rather plump but nicely so, and an enquiring but not unfriendly look.

  They spoke together and both of them laughed and suddenly, and rather oddly, they were friends at once.

  ‘I do hope I’m not disturbing you,’ Dan said. ‘I suppose you couldn’t be … no.’ He shook his head as if disgusted with himself. ‘What a crazy idea. You’re far too young. I was hoping to see Mrs Honor Trevannion. I know she’s been ill …’

  The woman’s expression stopped him, her eyes were brimming with tears, and his spirits sank again.

  ‘Mrs Trevannion died in the early hours of Tuesday morning,’ she told him sadly. ‘She was my mother.’

  ‘Oh, my God,’ he said softly. ‘I am just so sorry. I had no idea, please forgive me for troubling you.’

  ‘No, no, it’s quite all right.’ She seemed to recover a little. ‘Is there anything I can do?’

  ‘I’d hate to trouble you at a time like this.’ He hesitated and then gestured helplessly. ‘Well, OK. I sent Mrs Trevannion a photograph of her wedding taken with my great-aunt. A double wedding. They worked together out in India, apparently, and then my great-aunt stopped writing. I hoped I might learn a little more about her. She seemed to disappear round about the time of India’s Independence and, by that time, my grandmother – her sister – had married and moved out to the US. We found this photograph of a double wedding with their names on the back—’

  ‘Oh, I’ve seen that,’ the woman interrupted almost excitedly. ‘Mousie showed it to me. I remember now her telling me that you’d sent it. Look, why don’t you come in and have a cup of tea? I’m just making one.’

  ‘Well, that’s real kind.’ He was a little confused by such a different reception but still felt awkward lest his enquiries were out of order at such a time. ‘I have to go back to London at the weekend …’

  She was welcoming him i
n, introducing herself: Emma Fox. They shook hands and he held up the briefcase, feeling foolishly shy.

  ‘I have some more photographs here. Perhaps you’d like to see them? Were you born in India, Emma?’

  ‘Yes, I was but I can’t remember much about it, I’m afraid.’ She was leading him across the hall. ‘Do you mind if we go into the kitchen while I make us some tea?’

  ‘Not at all.’ He looked about him appreciatively. ‘What a lovely house it is. Well, the whole place is so beautiful. It surely is Paradise.’

  She beamed at him so warmly that he smiled back at her with real affection: he felt the oddest sensation that he’d known her always.

  ‘Mousie showed me the photograph,’ she was saying. ‘And I said that those old photographs always made me feel rather sad. It was a nice one of Mutt, though, and she looked so much like Joss, even in her funny little hat.’

  ‘Joss?’ He sat down at the table and watched her prepare the tea. She took a cake tin from the larder and edged the Victoria sponge onto a pretty, flowered plate.

  ‘Help yourself. Take a big piece.’ She provided him with a plate and a fork. ‘Joss is my daughter. She’s an osteopath and she’s been living here with her grandmother for the last few months. She’s absolutely devastated by her death.’

  ‘I think I’ve seen her.’ He cut himself a piece of cake, beginning to enjoy himself. ‘Not to speak to, though. A dark-haired girl, very pretty?’

  ‘Well, I think she’s rather special.’

  Joss’s mother spoke proudly and Dan’s heart warmed to her.

  ‘She’s not here today?’ he asked hopefully.

  Emma shook her head. ‘She’s at her practice in Wadebridge today. She won’t be home much before six o’clock.’

  He could see her hesitating, wondering whether to suggest that he should stay on to meet Joss and if such a meeting would be appropriate at such a time.

  ‘Would you like to see the photographs?’ he asked tactfully, hoping to rescue her from her dilemma. ‘I’ve only got the one wedding photograph, I’m afraid, but I suppose that there’s a faint possibility that you might remember something. My Great-Aunt Madeleine had a daughter who would have been about your age. Her name was Lottie.’

  She’d put the teapot on the table now, and was watching him open the briefcase.

  ‘How odd,’ she said slowly. ‘Lottie. That name certainly rings a bell.’ She sat down opposite him, looking puzzled. ‘D’you know, Mutt spoke that name only a few days ago in her sleep. She called out several times. “Lottie. Lottie.” She seemed distressed … Good heavens. Do you think she knew something about what might have happened to Lottie?’

  They stared at each other across the table, the briefcase between them, a few photographs already lying there beside his plate.

  ‘If my great-aunt and your mother were such close friends that they had a double wedding,’ Dan observed thoughtfully, ‘it wouldn’t be surprising.’

  ‘I know it was a terrible time in India just before we came home,’ Emma told him. ‘There were riots and killings. Where we were, in Multan, there was a twenty-four-hour curfew just before we came away. Perhaps something … well, something terrible happened to Lottie.’

  ‘You mean she might have been killed in one of the riots?’

  ‘I suppose your great-aunt and Lottie could have accidentally got caught up in a mob rising or something.’ Emma was thinking it through. ‘Bruno – he’s my older brother – might remember, although I did ask him if he knew anyone called Lottie, after I heard Mutt calling the name in her sleep, and he said he didn’t.’

  ‘Maybe he wasn’t thinking far enough back.’ Dan was feeling excited. ‘It’s a long time ago. Perhaps if he thought real hard …’

  Emma nodded, clearly as fascinated as he was. ‘I’ll ask him again.’ She picked up the photograph. ‘Now this is the photograph I saw, isn’t it?’

  ‘That’s the wedding.’ He gathered a few more together, ready to pass across the table to her. ‘This is the original and there are the names on the back. That’s how I managed to track you down. Trevannion is not a common name and Madeleine had written somewhere that you all came from Cornwall, England. My grandmother remembered that.’

  She smiled at him. ‘Is she still alive, your grandmother?’

  A shadow touched his face. ‘She died last year. She was a great old girl and I promised her I’d try to find out what happened to her sister. You know how it is? You get busy and preoccupied with your own life and then, when you grow old, your mind seems to go way back into the past. She got quite intense and upset about it. I remember she said once that, if she’d been a bit more generous, Madeleine and Lottie would have come to her after the war and perhaps then they’d have still been alive. She felt that they must be dead, you see, because the letters stopped coming.’

  Her sympathy was evident and she reached across and touched his hand lightly.

  ‘I am so sorry,’ she said gently. ‘It’s awful, isn’t it? To think that you’ve neglected some act of kindness when it’s too late to repair the damage.’

  He nodded. ‘It’s crazy,’ he said slowly, ‘but I just feel I’m trying to put it right for her, as far as I can.’ He shrugged. ‘I can’t bring them back to life but I just want to try to lay a few ghosts.’

  ‘I wish I could help you.’ She took the photograph, holding it up. ‘It’s just so amazing to see the likeness. If you take away the hat,’ she covered a part of the picture with her hand, ‘that’s Joss. There. Do you recognize her?’

  He stared at the face, smiling out at him. He hadn’t seen Joss smile but the likeness was certainly very strong.

  ‘Yes,’ he said slowly. ‘I see a likeness to the girl who was here last Saturday. But this is very odd …’

  He hesitated, frowning in consternation, and Emma turned the picture back so that she could look at it again.

  ‘Now I remember why I said it was odd last time,’ she exclaimed. ‘How strange! Do you see? The brides are with the wrong grooms. Mutt isn’t standing with Hubert. I wonder why not. Do you think it was for a joke?’

  He was silent for such a time that she looked up at him enquiringly.

  ‘It would seem a bit weird,’ he said slowly, ‘to do that for a wedding photograph you were planning to send back home to your own folk, wouldn’t it? Unless you explained the joke, of course. Madeleine just wrote the words “Me and Johnny with Hubert and Honor Trevannion” on the back. See?’ He took another breath. ‘Could you just tell me again? Is this the lady you call Mutt?’ He pointed. ‘This is your mother?’

  Emma nodded, still frowning. ‘Yes, that’s Mutt. How extraordinary. It must have been a joke, surely?’

  ‘The thing is …’ He bit his lip, his face worried. ‘The thing is,’ he began again, ‘that this lady you call Mutt is my great-aunt, Madeleine.’

  They stared at each other, perplexed, tea and cake forgotten.

  ‘But how can it be?’ asked Emma reasonably enough. ‘There’s a muddle somewhere. Why do you think she’s your great-aunt and not the other woman? I still think it was taken as a silly joke and the wrong photograph got sent home to your family.’

  ‘No, no.’ He shook his head very positively. ‘Look here. See this one.’

  He held out another photograph to her across the table. The young woman was seated, staring straight at the camera, a baby cradled tenderly in her arms with its long gown trailing over her knee. Behind her a tall, fair man looked down on both of them with a proud smile.

  ‘But that’s Mutt.’ Emma was clearly taken aback. ‘Who is the man with her? And could that be Bruno?’

  She turned the photograph to read the writing on the back: ‘Me and Johnny with Lottie. Lahore 1945.’ The writing was Mutt’s.

  Silently, feeling nervous now, Dan passed another snapshot to her. The two girls, clearly sisters, stood arm-in-arm, beaming at the unknown photographer; the younger girl’s hair was cut short and the resemblance to Joss was even more marked. Sl
owly, Emma reversed the snapshot: the faded ink was slightly blurred but clear enough to read the words: ‘Vivian and Madeleine in the garden. 1936.’

  She looked at him, clearly frightened, and he stared back at her with distress; he hadn’t been prepared for this.

  ‘What does it mean?’ she asked, her voice trembling a little. ‘I don’t understand it.’

  ‘Neither do I.’ He tried to keep his voice level. ‘Do you have any photographs of your mother taken out there in India when she was young? Or when she was a child?’

  Emma shook her head, her brow furrowed, shuffling the photographs as if they were cards and studying them.

  ‘I don’t understand it,’ she said again. ‘This is Mutt, you see. But who is the man, Johnny? And who is Lottie? Can she have been married before she met my father? Maybe she was a widow … No, that doesn’t work.’

  ‘Not with the wedding photograph as evidence,’ he agreed. ‘This man you see her standing with is Johnny, isn’t it? It’s the same man. Yet Hubert Trevannion is in the same photograph with them.’

  Emma stared at it. ‘Then who is this woman?’ she asked.

  There was a short silence; Dan heard the front door open and close again quietly and someone came into the kitchen behind him.

  Emma gave a little cry of relief and Dan stood up quickly, recognizing the woman, feeling as guilty as if he were a thief, gaining access under false pretences.

  ‘Mousie,’ Emma was saying, her words tumbling out in a rush, ‘something so strange is going on here.’ She gestured with the photographs. ‘We simply can’t understand it.’

  Dan knew that the woman called Mousie could hear the panic in her voice and he was relieved when she smiled quite calmly, giving him a little nod of recognition but concentrating on Emma.

  ‘I can guess that it must be very confusing,’ she said. ‘I had a feeling something like this might be happening so I’ve brought some letters to show you. Will you come with me, Emma? They’ll explain any confusion, I promise. We’ll leave Mr Crosby to his tea and cake just for a moment,’ she flashed him a quick reassuring smile, ‘but this is rather private.’