The Time of the Hunter's Moon

by Victoria Holt

  I went to bed. I was tired and soon asleep.

  In the morning Eugenie was better—almost herself, but I thought she should take a little rest. She didn’t want to. She was rather ashamed of being ill.

  “I’m all right really, Miss Grant. I don’t know what it was but I just felt a bit funny.”

  “I think you should have a rest this afternoon.”

  “Oh no, Miss Grant.”

  “Yes, Eugenie. That sort of attack does weaken you more than you realize. I insist that you have a rest this afternoon. You can read or perhaps Charlotte will be with you.”

  She agreed rather ungraciously.

  It must have been about three o’clock when I went to my room and remembering that Eugenie was resting, I thought I would look in and see if she had obeyed my orders.

  The door was closed but I heard the sound of giggles coming from behind it. I guessed Charlotte was with her.

  I hesitated, but decided to look in. I tapped at the door. There was a brief silence so I opened it and went in.

  Eugenie was lying on her bed and Charlotte was stretched out on hers. On the chair sat Elsa.

  “Oh,” I said.

  “You told me to rest,” replied Eugenie.

  “We came to cheer her up,” said Elsa grinning at me.

  “You certainly seem to have done that. How are you feeling, Eugenie?”

  “All right,” said Eugenie.

  “Good. Very well, you can get up when you want to.”

  “Thank you, Miss Grant.”

  As I went out and shut the door the giggles continued.

  I thought about Elsa. She certainly did not behave like a servant and I wondered, as I had on other occasions, whether I should reprimand her for consorting with the girls as though she were one of them rather than a housemaid. But she always contrived to remind me by a look of the old times at Schaffenbrucken when she had behaved with me and my friends rather in the same way as she was with Eugenie and Charlotte. It was one of the disadvantages of being in a position like mine, when someone who had known you as a schoolgirl was present. One could hardly reprimand others for what one had done oneself. Perhaps the most extraordinary aspect was that Charlotte, known to us all as something of a snob, should be so friendly with a servant.

  However, I did not think very much more about the incident.

  There was a letter for me from John Markham. He asked me what it felt like to be back at school after the holidays. “That was an unforgettable week we all had together,” he wrote. “I felt we had all known each other for years. Why ever didn’t Lydia ask you for holidays? We might have known each other earlier. I do wish I could see you. Is it taboo to visit the school? I suppose it would not be considered quite comme il faut. Isn’t there something called a half term? Do you go home? Perhaps it is rather a long way for such a short time. It wouldn’t be quite so far to come to London. I’d like you to meet my brother Charles. Perhaps you and Teresa could visit us? Do think about it.”

  I did think about it and it was rather enticing. I did not mention it to Teresa because I felt it would raise her hopes and I was not sure whether I should go.

  I was still suffering from the shock of my encounter with Jason Verringer in the Devil’s Den at Colby Hall. It had disturbed me even more than I had thought at the time. I could not stop thinking of him and my mind built up images of what might have happened if I had not made that dramatic gesture in thrusting my hands through the window. It had been a hopeless gesture in any case. I should never have been able to elude him if he was determined to catch me. And if I had managed to get through the window, would I have jumped from the top of the tower? What I had implied was that I preferred death to submission to him. It was foolhardy. Yet it had sobered him. He had been really shocked to see the blood on my hands.

  Stop thinking of him, I admonished myself. Forget him. It was just an unpleasant experience from which I had emerged unscathed. Even the scars on my hands had healed now. But at Colby I was surrounded by ruins of the past with all the grim legends and terrible sufferings that must have occurred and I was overwhelmed by an ambience of disaster and doom.

  Here strange things happened. Jason Verringer seemed never far away. What had really happened to his wife? Where was Marcia Martindale? There would always be questions where Jason was. He was a man of dark secrets. One could almost believe that the Devil had been one of his forebears.

  And how different it had been at Epping—the sunshine, the smell of hay, the simplicity of everything, the way of life, the people. It was clean and fresh and easy to understand. Peace…that was what it offered…and peace seemed very alluring just now. I had a desire to be there and yet…almost against my will I was drawn to the dark towers of Colby Hall and the ruins of the Abbey.

  What finally decided me about taking up John’s invitation was another letter I had. It was forwarded on to me by Aunt Patty and was from Monique Delorme.

  “Dear Cordelia,” she wrote in French.

  “I am no longer Mademoiselle Delorme but Madame de la Creseuse. Yes. I married Henri. Life is wonderful. We are coming to London. We have been lent a house for two weeks by friends of Henri. So we shall be in your capital from the third of next month. It would be wonderful to see you. Write to me there. I will give you the address. I look forward to hearing your news. Do come.

  Always your loving and faithful friend.

  Monique.”

  I told Daisy that I had received an invitation from some friends with whom we had stayed in the summer.

  “Their home is in London, but we were with them in the country for a week. I could go in mid-term. It is only for five days, including the week-end. I thought I might take advantage of it.”

  Daisy was thoughtful. “Few of the girls will go home. Of course there are no lessons. I don’t think any of the other mistresses plan to go away. Yes, I do think you might manage it.”

  “Teresa is invited too.”

  “Oh, that will be nice for her.”

  “Then it is quite all right for me to make my plans?”

  “Yes. I think so. Go ahead.”

  So I did. John wrote back that he was delighted. Teresa was wild with joy. I also wrote to Monique at the address she had enclosed in her letter and said that I would call on her when she was in London.

  ***

  John was at Paddington station and in a short time we were trotting along in a cab to his home in Kensington. It was a tall house in a square and guarded by two ferocious-looking stone lions; the white steps leading to a heavy oak door were gleaming and the brass shone like gold.

  When he opened the door with his key a tall young man was hovering in the hall.

  “This is Charles,” said John. “He’s longing to meet you. He’s heard all about your stay at the farm.”

  It was the same open face and good looks. I liked Charles at once.

  The maid appeared.

  “Oh yes, Sarah,” said John. “They’ll want to go to their rooms. Teresa, you are next to Cordelia.”

  We mounted a staircase richly carpeted in a warm scarlet and came to a landing. The maid opened a door and I was in a bright bedroom with a four-poster bed, not a bit like the ones they had at the Hall, heavily curtained in velvet. This one had lace curtains draped at either end and caught into bows of pale mauve satin ribbon. It had brass knobs and rails and seemed to glow with freshness. There was some light and elegant furniture which suggested eighteenth-century France. It was charming. I went to the window and looked out on a small paved garden in which were pots of greenery which must glow with color in the spring and summer. Chrysanthemums and Michaelmas daisies were still in flower against a gray brick wall.

  Teresa came in. She looked radiant. She had a lovely little room and there was a communicating door between it and mine. I went in and had a look. It had obviously been a dressing room.

  “Isn’t it wonderful?” she cried.

  She was so happy. Not only to get away from school but because we w
ere here with John. She was a girl who fixed her affections firmly when she found an object of admiration. She had turned to me in desperation and from our association had come all the people she cared for most. Myself. Aunt Patty. Violet. And now she had added John to that band. It was overwhelming for her who had had no one and then suddenly so many.

  I feared she was a little dramatic. I should never forget how she had flung Marcia Martindale’s earring into the ponds. She was so young and had little control over her emotions and being inexperienced saw everyone as very good or very bad. There were devils and angels…and nothing in between. She would have to learn, but for the next few days she would be with those whom she loved and admired and was happy.

  Dinner that night was exciting. There was a gracious dining room with long windows onto the street. As we ate we heard the clop clop of passing horse-drawn carriages and occasionally the sound of a newsboy selling late night papers.

  We talked of the week in the country, of school, of London and what we should do during our stay.

  “There is so much to show you,” said John. “Now what shall it be first?”

  “I have an appointment with an old school friend,” I said. “She has invited me to call. That is for the day after tomorrow.”

  “Well then, what’s for tomorrow? Teresa, have you any idea? The zoo is amusing.”

  “I like animals,” cried Teresa.

  “All right then. Tomorrow morning zoo. How would you like to ride in the Row, Teresa?”

  Teresa was slightly less enthusiastic. She had never fully recovered from her fall, although I had persuaded her to ride again. “Yes,” she said hesitantly.

  So it was agreed.

  We had a wonderful morning. It was not only Teresa who was delighted by the animals. We watched the seals fed; we marveled at the lions and tigers; and we laughed at the antics of the monkeys. We sipped lemonade on the terraces and I thought how happy I was. I did not want the visit to end.

  Dinner was a hilarious affair with everyone—now that they had got used to us—trying to talk at once. We sat in the elegant drawing room, rather like the dining room only at the back of the house instead of the front with French windows facing the little patio-like garden.

  We talked until we were drowsy and rather reluctantly retired to our beds because this was the end of another happy day.

  ***

  John had to go to his bank on the next morning and on the way there took me to the address which Monique had given me.

  It was an elegant house in Albemarle Street leading off Piccadilly. We had driven through Hyde Park, which I thought enchanting, then turned into Piccadilly, where fashionably attired people strolled, and the horses and carriage passed picturesquely down the main thoroughfare.

  John took me in. A smart young maid said that Madame was waiting for me. I was ushered into a drawing room and there was Monique looking very pretty indeed in a frilly morning gown of turquoise blue.

  I introduced John, and Monique begged him to take a little coffee or wine with us, but he said he had business in the City and would collect me in two hours’ time.

  “So soon?” said Monique in her attractive English.

  “I shall have to go then,” I said, “for we have arranged to take a trip on the river this afternoon.”

  John left us and we settled down.

  “What a charming man!” said Monique, when he had gone. “Henri, too, is out on business. He hopes to meet you when he comes back. I have talked so much of you.”

  I said: “Marriage suits you, Monique.”

  “Oh, Henri…he is so good.”

  “It turned out very well then…You used to call it your mariage de convenance. Do you remember?”

  “Oh yes, it was decided in our cradles. Oh, the papers and the lawyers…the settlement…the arguments.”

  “And it worked!”

  “And this Mr. Markham…he is for you?”

  “Oh no. He’s just a friend. I should have told you. He is Lydia’s brother.”

  “Of course…Lydia Markham. Where is Lydia then?”

  “Oh…you don’t know…Lydia died.”

  “But no!”

  “It was a skiing accident.”

  “Lydia…skiing! I am surprised. But how terrible. I never knew.”

  “Well, I suppose I shouldn’t have heard if I hadn’t written to her. Her brother opened my letter and then came to see me. That was when I was with my aunt.”

  “Oh, the aunt, yes. How you used to talk about the aunt! Who was it?”

  “Aunt Patty.”

  “The good Aunt Patty.”

  The maid came in bringing coffee. When she had gone Monique poured.

  “I cannot stop thinking about Lydia…To die like that. It is hard to believe.”

  “Yes, a terrible shock. I was astonished when her brother told me she had married.”

  “Oh, I knew that. Lydia wrote and told me so. She was wildly happy.”

  “She didn’t write to me.”

  Monique was silent and I looked at her sharply. Her lips were pressed together. I remembered that it was an old habit of hers. It meant that she knew something which she should not tell.

  “I wondered why she didn’t write to me,” I said. “When I wrote to you I wrote to her also. I had replies from you and Frieda but nothing from Lydia.”

  “Well, she didn’t write to you because…”

  “Because what?”

  “Oh…I don’t suppose it matters now. She thought you might be a little upset.”

  “Upset? Why should I be?”

  “About her being the one to get married, you see.”

  “Why should I be upset?”

  “Well, because we thought, didn’t we, that you were the one.”

  I looked blank.

  “I’m sure it doesn’t matter now. It might have been you who had the skiing accident. But I don’t suppose you would have. You would have been better at it.”

  “I don’t really follow all this, Monique.”

  “Cast your mind back. Do you remember Elsa?”

  “Yes, and it’s a funny thing. She’s at my school now.”

  “Elsa…at your school? Well, that is very strange. What they call a coincidence, of course.”

  “She said she got tired of Schaffenbrucken and came to England. She had one job which she didn’t like and ended up at my school.”

  “Very odd. But then life is.”

  “You were telling me about Lydia.”

  “I was saying do you remember how Elsa told us that if we went into the forest at the time of the Hunter’s Moon we might meet our future husbands?”

  “Yes. We were a silly lot. We believed it.”

  “Well, there was something in it. Do you remember the man we called the Stranger?”

  “Yes, yes, I do remember.”

  “We thought he liked you. He seemed to. That was why Lydia didn’t want you to know she was married. She thought you’d be upset because you would know it wasn’t you he had liked after all. It was Lydia.”

  The room was swinging round me. I could not believe I was hearing correctly.

  I said: “His name was Edward Compton.”

  “No, it wasn’t that. It was er…let me think…Mark somebody. Mark Chessingham…or ton…or something.”

  “It couldn’t have been.”

  “Yes, it was. She was ever so excited. She said it was true about meeting your future husband. Elsa was right about that. But she said she wasn’t telling you because she thought you might be hurt. What’s the matter?”

  “Nothing. It seemed so odd…”

  “You do mind, Cordelia. You did think that he…”

  “I’d almost forgotten him. I’d told myself he didn’t exist.”

  “Oh, he existed all right. He was Lydia’s husband. Poor Lydia! He was very good-looking, wasn’t he? I only saw him once but he really was…fascinating. Do have some more coffee.”

  She went on talking but I was not listening
to what she said. I could only think. So he went away and married Lydia. But why had he said his name was that of a man who had been dead for twenty years?

  I don’t think Monique found my visit as exciting as she had thought it was going to be. John called for me as we had arranged and I was immensely relieved when we said goodbye to Monique and her husband who had returned just before our departure.

  As we drove to Kensington, I said: “I have made an alarming discovery.”

  Then I told him about the man in the forest and how I had seen him on the boat and again at Grantley, how he had disappeared suddenly and that when I had gone to the village in Suffolk where he had told me his home was, I found that the Manor House which he had said was his home was burned out and the name he had given me was on the tombstone of a man who had died twenty years before. And this, according to Monique, was Lydia’s husband.

  He listened intently. He said it was an incredible story and he wondered what it meant.

  “I’ll tell you what we’ll do,” he went on. “We’ll go down to that Suffolk village where you saw the tombstone and we’ll see what we can find out.”

  ***

  There was a train to Bury St. Edmunds at eight thirty next morning and John and I decided to catch it. Charles was taking Teresa on the river from Westminster Stairs to Hampton Court so they were safely disposed of.

  It was a relief to be able to talk to John about this strange affair, because I did feel now that it not only concerned me but Lydia.

  He asked me to describe the man. It wasn’t easy because the description could fit so many. Not that he was ordinary by any means. But fair curling hair, blue eyes, chiseled features…many had those, and it was not easy to explain that quality of otherworldliness.

  I told myself there must have been a mistake. Lydia could have imagined that her lover was the romantic stranger she had met in the wood at the time of the Hunter’s Moon.

  “I can’t believe that she would do that. Lydia wasn’t a dreamer. She was very practical really.”

  “That’s true. How are we going to start looking?”

  “Well, his name is Edward Compton or Mark Chessingham.”