It was nearly midnight. Soon it would be 1920. A new year. A new life.
The waltz finished. He held her hand and her eyes and said, ‘We can’t funk it any longer, can we?’
She shook her head.
It was time.
Truth
Where shall we go?’ she said. ‘Is there anywhere... private? Where we can’t be overheard?’
There were couples all over the house – on the stairs, in the hallway, in several of the windowseats and powder rooms and smoking-rooms. Everywhere there were other people. And this wasn’t a conversation that could be whispered.
‘It’s all right,’ said Harry. ‘We can go up to Basil’s dressing room – I cleared it with him. It’s just up here.’
‘Goodness,’ said Margot. Basil Henderson was the eldest Henderson boy, and something of a grand figure in the village. She felt rather impressed.
They went up the old staircase. There were girls on the stairs laughing together, and yet another boy and a girl half-hidden behind the curtains. They passed a footman busily engaged in emptying the overflowing ashtrays – he didn’t blink as they went past, through the billiard room – four or five young men here, playing billiards and smoking, no wonder there were no partners downstairs! – down a corridor, and into a small room, which smelt of old wood and hair oil. He flicked on the light switch and there they stood, looking at each other, aware all at once of their closeness.
It was very cold. She hugged herself, wishing she’d brought her wrap.
‘Here.’ He took off his jacket and draped it around her shoulders.
‘Well,’ he said.
They stared at each other.
She opened her mouth. ‘I...’ she said, and then she shut it.
Because how could she do it to him? Bad enough that she had to live with this. But to force the man she – the man she loved – to force him to share it? How could she? It was barbarous. Much better to leave him ignorant.
It wasn’t as though she could take James away from her mother. She’d known it all along really. Her mother, who’d been so good to her. Her mother who’d lost one child already, to ask her to lose a second! And James. To take him away from his whole family... ? How could she even think it?
Had she ever, really, thought it might be possible?
And since it wasn’t possible – she should let it lie. Let her mother be happy. Let James be happy. Let Harry be happy too. He’d get over her. The girl he’d loved when he was nineteen? It wasn’t as though it would be exactly hard to find someone else.
She should let it go. She should let him go. Anything else would be selfish.
‘Margot?’ he said, and she shook her head.
‘I don’t think I can,’ she whispered.
Harry reached over and took her hands, very gently, in his.
‘Look here,’ he said. ‘I’ve something I want to say to you. I’m going to say it and then if you don’t want to answer, I suppose we really are done. But I want to say it first.’
She nodded.
‘There’s something you’re hiding from me,’ Harry said. ‘You said so yourself, and all these people keep hinting at it: Mary –’ Mary! – ‘And Jocelyn, and your mother. They keep acting as though there’s a perfectly rational reason for the way you’re behaving, and I’ve only to wait until you tell me yourself and all will be clear. Well, Margot, I have waited. And it’s driving me mad. Was there another man? Is that it? You said not, but... You can tell me, you know. I’m a man of the world. I just—’
‘Oh, no, no!’ Margot cried. ‘There isn’t anyone else – of course there isn’t. You’re the only – it’s only ever been...’
She stopped in confusion.
‘But there’s something,’ he said. ‘Isn’t there?’
She twisted her head away.
‘Tell me,’ he said. ‘Whatever it is, I can take it.’
Tears started in her eyes and spilled down her cheeks.
He put his arms around her and held her. She buried her face against his chest, like James against her mother, and at this thought the tears threatened to overwhelm her.
‘Tell me,’ he said, more quietly.
She pulled herself away, so she could look at him properly.
‘James,’ she said.
He stared at her, uncomprehending.
‘James, my brother. Only he isn’t my brother. He’s my son.’ He was still staring. ‘He’s your son.’
His mouth opened.
‘My God,’ he said quietly.
‘Now can’t you see?’ she exclaimed. ‘How could I tell you? It’s tearing me apart. I can’t bear it – I can’t... Oh!’ She shook her head furiously. ‘What I would give to be a man – not to know – not to have to know. What good could it do to tell you?’
‘What good ?’ he said, suddenly angry. ‘You were going to walk away from me for ever – do I matter to you that little? I’m nothing ?’
‘Nothing! I was being kind,’ she said, realising as she said it how ridiculous she sounded. ‘I was choosing – I was sacrificing my happiness to – to save you from this hell.’
‘Your happiness!’ He looked as though he were going to shake her. ‘What about my happiness? My marriage – my future? You were going to let me think you’d found another man – because you thought it would save my feelings ? I have a son – a two-year-old child – and you weren’t even going to tell me!’
‘I knew you’d be angry,’ said Margot. ‘I suppose you can’t bear to look at me now, can you? A woman with an illegitimate child? He’s your child too, as much as mine! Whatever sin I committed, you committed too!’
‘Don’t be absurd.’ Was it her imagination, or was he rather more vehement than necessary? ‘I’m – well, dammit, it’s a bit of a shock, you must see that? I – well, I’m insulted, I suppose. Do you really think so little of me?’
She looked down.
‘It wasn’t exactly that,’ she said. Shamed into honesty, she admitted: ‘I didn’t know how to tell you... or if I even wanted to tell you. It’s been so long... and I’m so different... and so are you. You are, aren’t you?’
‘I am.’
There was a pause. She said, desperately trying to draw the conversation back onto her turf.
‘Don’t you want to know about it? About... about what happened, and James, and everything?’
‘Go on then.’ His voice was hard.
‘Harry—’
‘Go on! You want to tell me, tell me! You can’t expect me to be pleased about something like this, can you?’
‘You’re being unfair,’ she pleaded, and he, clearly knowing it but not yet able to admit it, said, ‘Well, go on, go on! Say what you want to say!’
She wanted more, but evidently she was not going to get it. So, stumblingly, she began to tell. About her parents, and the home. About having to leave school – and for the first time, she realised what a loss that had been. She had never expected to go to university or anything like that, but she had loved her school, and her friends, and being nymphs in the school play, and walking down the high street of the little market town arm-in-arm, and sitting on the grass in summer watching the hockey matches and making daisy chains. James had taken all of that from her too. She barely spoke to any of her school friends now.
She told him – or tried to tell him – how awful it had been, how separate she had felt from everyone and everything.
‘What did you expect me to do? I wanted to do what’s right for James, but I don’t know what the right thing is. I feel like whatever I do, I’m letting someone down. I’ve spent two years worrying that I did this terrible thing, giving him up, but the more I think about it, the more I realise there isn’t a right thing. Whatever choice I made, I was going to hurt someone.’
This at least he seemed to understand.
‘How do you think I feel?’ he said. ‘What the blazes am I supposed to do now? Should I – I mean, does
your father want money? God! They must hate me.’
‘Oh no!’ she cried. ‘No, they don’t at all.’ Was that a lie? ‘And you mustn’t try and pay them off, it wasn’t like that at all. They – they think of James as quite their own, you see. They wouldn’t – wouldn’t want to confuse that.’
‘I see.’
She looked at him rather sadly.
‘You told me you could never hate me,’ she said. ‘But you do. I knew you would.’
‘Hate you!’ he said. ‘You think this is hate?’
In the ballroom below, the music had stopped – she wondered vaguely why. There was nothing now between them. She felt his presence like electricity on her skin.
‘Then what is it?’ she said. ‘You don’t still want me? After all this?’
He did not answer. Instead, he bent and kissed her, on the lips.
‘I don’t know what I want,’ he said. ‘But I know I’ve never loved anybody the way I love you. And right now, I can’t imagine I ever will.’
In the village, the church clock began to chime the hour.
Dong – dong...
Below them, voices were shouting.
‘Happy new year!’
‘Happy nineteen-twenty!’
He pulled away and looked at her.
‘It’s the new year,’ he murmured.
She closed her eyes. His lips on hers again. Her lips on his.
The Reverend
A restless night. Old dreams. The one where she’d lost the baby – she’d only put him down for a moment and now he was gone and she couldn’t find him anywhere. She was never going to find him. He was lost for ever, but she couldn’t stop searching.
She woke early and lay in her bed, listening to the rain falling outside the window. Her room was above the kitchen, and she could hear Edith clattering about downstairs, starting the fire, baking the bread, beginning the day.
She had told him. And he still loved her. But... what did that mean?
What happened now?
A new life? A new future? A room in a busy farmhouse somewhere up on the dales? Fresh milk in the morning, and eggs for breakfast, and little children who looked like James jumping on haystacks, and fishing for frogs, and feeding the calves in the spring? Geese – could they keep geese? And goats. James would love a baby goat.
But James wouldn’t be there, she reminded herself.
Harry will be there, she told herself. And we’ll have children, lots of them. And I won’t be lonely. And perhaps Mother might let James come and stay for the holidays.
But did Harry still want that? She didn’t know. He hadn’t said he wanted to marry her, after all. You could love somebody and not want to be with them. Would she want to be with Harry, if he’d done something like that to her?
As she lay wondering, she heard the creak of her father’s door across the landing, and the soft tread of his feet down the stairs. Her father always woke up early. He said the half an hour before breakfast was the only time he had to himself all day. He sat in his icy little study, praying and reading the Bible, readying himself to face the troubles of the world.
As children they’d always been told never to disturb him and normally Margot wouldn’t have dreamed of it, but these were not normal times...
Surely he would let her speak to him? She felt she must have this conversation now, or it would be too late.
She fumbled in the early-morning dark for the matches, struck one, and lit the candle. By the light of the candle flame, she lit the gas and dimmed the jet so as not to wake Jocelyn. Then, without bothering to wash – Edith had not brought the hot water yet, of course – she dressed herself – goodness, it was cold! – and slipped on her shoes.
The gas in the hallway was already lit. She padded downstairs as quietly as she could, and knocked on the study door.
‘Come in.’
He was sitting at his desk, the Bible and what looked like a letter open on his knee. He looked, in the early-morning dimness, rather small and faded and, yes, old. He was a grandfather now. His hair was thin and pale.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I didn’t mean – I just – I wanted...’
‘It’s quite all right.’ He motioned to the other seat. She felt suddenly as though she were in a headmistress’s office, about to be given a dressing-down for talking to a boy on the way home from prep.
He watched her with an expression she recognised from his dealings with parishioners, but had never seen directed at herself before. A sort of expectant waiting. It made her strangely angry.
‘I told Harry about James,’ she said abruptly.
‘And?’
And how could she repeat that conversation for him?
‘It’s complicated. But – well. I think he still likes me.’
‘And is he going to marry you?’
Always the vicar. Why did it still come down to this? A ring or no ring. Why did it matter so much?
‘I don’t know. He’s – it was rather a shock.’
‘Naturally. Still, he’s a reasonable young man. One hopes that when he’s had some time to think about it...’
‘You want me to marry him?’ Margot was surprised. ‘I thought you hated him.’
‘I try not to hate anybody,’ the vicar said. ‘But, naturally when you were so young... You can’t blame us for being angry.’
She felt her hackles rising.
‘All right!’ she said. ‘I know we were idiotic, but – well, you don’t know what it was like. Him going off to the War and—’
‘Really, Margot.’ Her father looked almost amused. ‘I don’t know why everyone assumes vicars are so unworldly. I spend my life counselling to the wretched of the earth. I do know what lust is.’
Margot goggled. She knew he had five children, but still...
‘You weren’t the first children to behave like fools, and you won’t be the last,’ her father said. ‘But thousands of other young people faced the same test and came through with honour.’
Oh God.
‘Damn you!’ she said, suddenly furious. ‘Damn you, damn you! Do you think I don’t know that? Do you think I haven’t suffered for it? I gave up my baby. When I think of the life he should have had – if only we’d married – if only he could have been mine, honestly. One day he’ll find out that his mother gave him up, and I’ll never forgive myself for it. Never!’
If her father was shocked, he didn’t say so. He kept watching her with the same level expression.
‘God can forgive much greater sins than that,’ he said. For some reason this infuriated Margot even more.
‘Just stop it!’ she cried. ‘Stop treating me like one of your parishioners! I’m your daughter! And you just – just sit there and let Mother decide everything, and you never talk to me, and – I thought you were supposed to be so good at these sorts of things! You’re rotten at it!’
Her father stared at her. Then he took off his spectacles, and rubbed his eyes.
‘You’re quite right,’ he said.
‘Oh, no...’ said Margot, shocked. She couldn’t be right. Children weren’t right.
Except she wasn’t a child.
‘When it comes to my own son and daughter, I am, it turns out, completely at a loss.’ He gave her a weary smile. ‘It seems my advice is much easier to give out than to follow.’
‘Why?’ said Margot. ‘What advice would you have given yourself?’
He spread out his hands.
‘Oh... talk to your children. Forgive them. Recognise that this war has made a mess of their lives, and they’re doing better than most at finding their way through it.’
‘Not me,’ said Margot. ‘I could hardly be doing much worse if I tried.’
‘You made a mistake,’ her father said. ‘And you’ve spent the last two years trying to put it right. You did what was best for James. You couldn’t do any better than that.’
She felt the tears start in her e
yes again.
‘And do you—’ She stopped, then started again. ‘Do you forgive me?’
He avoided her eye.
‘For a long time, I couldn’t,’ he said. ‘I tried. I prayed about you and Harry every day... but I was so angry. At what he’d done to you, and what you’d done to yourself. And James.’
How like her father. He didn’t pull his punches. But how strange to think of him sitting in this cold little room, praying every morning for the ability to forgive the boy who’d made such a crock of his daughter’s life.
‘But lately...’ He looked up and smiled at her. ‘James is such a blessing to us, Margot. I’ve always believed that God has His plan for us, and I’ve never been surer of it than now. James came to us just when we needed him the most. I expect it’s selfish of me, but I’m grateful that he did.’
Margot stared. This way of looking at the situation was an entirely new one to her.
‘Would you like me to pray with you?’ he asked. Her horror must have shown on her face, because he laughed. ‘Or not. You have my forgiveness, Margot, for what it’s worth. I can only hope that one day I may have yours.’
A Wooden Horse
Doris, could you go and see Mother for a minute, please? She wants to talk to you about some new clothes for Jamie.’
‘Of course, miss.’ Goodness, what a gormless girl! Could Mother really have found no one better?
‘We’ll keep an eye on James for you.’
‘Very good, miss.’
James was riding his wooden horse, an ill-favoured creature on wheels. It had been ridden at one time or another by all the vicarage children, and was missing its reins and half its tail. He seemed completely indifferent to Margot and Harry. Harry glanced at Margot, then at the child.
‘Hullo, James,’ he said. ‘I’m...’ He faltered. ‘What the devil am I supposed to say?’
‘This is Harry, Jamie-o,’ said Margot.
The Silent Stars Go By Page 13
