A Fatal Freedom (10 page)

‘Would that be Mr Rokeby, by any chance?’

‘That was the name he gave,’ said Meg. ‘He was very polite; asked if he could take her out to the square.’

‘Meg, if you don’t hurry with those tatties,’ said Mrs Crumble, shaking flour over the chunks of meat then piling them into the vast dish together with slices of carrot, ‘tea won’t be served ’til midnight. And have you riddled the range?’

Ursula went upstairs to her room wondering just what would happen now that the young man Alice had left her husband for had reappeared. She threw her straw hat on the bed, shrugged off her linen jacket and went to the window that overlooked the garden set in the middle of the square. The properties around it were furnished with keys to its gate and could enjoy the trees and shrubs that offered greenery and shade in the heart of London.

It was not that Ursula wanted to spy on the lovers but she could not resist the opportunity for a look at the tall young man she had seen with Alice and Rachel in the menagerie.

Thickly leaved trees guarded the privacy of those in the garden but from her second-floor window, Ursula had a view of the grassy interior. Almost immediately she saw the couple walking slowly along the path that ran round the garden. If Alice had flown rapturously into her lover’s arms on his arrival, it seemed that passion had now been put aside. She stared straight ahead as she walked with her arms wrapped around herself. Her body seemed rigid, as though she feared allowing feeling to escape. The young man walked with his hands clasped behind his back, listening with his gaze on the ground but glancing sideways every now and then.

Both of them were hatless and Daniel Rokeby’s red hair brushed the collar of his jacket. As Ursula watched, he ran a hand through it in a hopeless gesture, then took hold of Alice’s shoulders, forcing her to stand and face him. She looked up and shook her head in a despairing gesture. He tried to draw her into his arms. She resisted, pulling back, then suddenly crumpled against him and stood for a moment as he wrapped her in a tender embrace, resting his head on hers.

A moment later Alice tore herself away and flew out of the square. Daniel followed.

Ursula heard frantic steps pounding up the stairs. She left her room and tried to catch Alice.

‘My dear, what is it?’

Alice evaded her grasp, threw herself into her room and slammed the door. Ursula heard the key turn in the lock and then the sound of passionate weeping.

Daniel Rokeby came to a stop on the landing. ‘Which is her room?’ he said urgently to Ursula. ‘I must speak with her.’

Ursula put a restraining hand on his arm. ‘She has locked her door. You cannot be up here. Please, come with me.’

She led him downstairs and into the boarders’ parlour, thankful that it was empty. ‘What has happened?’ Ursula asked urgently, ignoring any necessity for introductions.

Daniel thrust his hands into his trouser pockets and looked blindly round the room as though seeking answers. ‘You must be Miss Grandison,’ he said in a moment of revelation. ‘Rachel told me about you. You were at the menagerie that afternoon.’

‘And you are Mr Rokeby,’ said Ursula impatiently. Please, what has happened with Alice? We are all so worried about her.’

Daniel thrust a hand through his untidy hair again, his expression desperate.

‘She says, oh, Miss Grandison, I don’t know how to say it. She declares she has to return to that evil son of the devil, Peters. It will kill her!’

Martha brought in the midday post and set it on the desk. ‘There’s one in Miss Alice’s hand,’ she said. Martha could never be brought to use Alice’s married name.

Rachel abandoned the legal document she had been commissioned to comment on; she might not be allowed to practice as a lawyer but she could use her legal expertise in other ways.

Immediately her sister had left with Ursula in John’s automobile, Rachel had waved goodbye to her aunt and returned home to write a letter to Alice telling her that they must not meet until after Daniel had returned and taken her under his protection; it could be too dangerous. The investigator might very well be watching her, Rachel, hoping she would lead him to where Alice was staying.

She had received one letter from her sister since, saying Rachel must not worry about her, that she was comfortably settled and hoping she would soon be with Daniel. There had been no more letters from her. Rachel had written to her every day, light notes describing what she had done, trying to maintain contact between them. But what Alice had been doing, her sister had no idea.

During the last few days, Rachel had considered visiting Mrs Bruton’s house in Wilton Crescent with the idea of meeting up with Ursula Grandison. She had liked the American woman very much. Not only for the help she had given at the menagerie but also for her openness and intelligence. No coy social chitchat with Ursula. And her actions had shown she might be acquainted with the investigator but she was not going to give Alice away. But the possibility of having to confront Mrs Bruton with the memory of the chaos Joshua Peters had caused at her tea party still so fresh had stayed her.

Now, at last, there had come a letter from Alice. Rachel eagerly ripped open the envelope. It was only short but the news it contained was devastating. Rachel shouted for Martha. ‘I’m going out, be back some time,’ she said, hastily securing her beret on top of her head with a couple of long pins and grabbing her gloves.

‘Right, Miss Rachel,’ said Martha, who had long ago given up questioning anything she did.

Arriving at Mrs Maple’s, Rachel hammered on the front door. It was opened immediately by a skinny maid.

‘My sister, Mrs Peters, where is she?’

‘Don’t know, miss, but Miss Grandison’s in the parlour …’ a hand was waved at a door.

Rachel rushed into the room. ‘I’m so glad to see you,’ she said to Ursula. ‘I’ve had a letter from Alice saying she intends returning to that, that
brute
!’ Then she saw who else was in the room. ‘Daniel, you have returned, thank heavens. She will listen to you.’

He shook his head hopelessly. ‘She says we must never see each other again.’

Rachel looked at Ursula.

She nodded and said, ‘She will not speak to me.’

‘I got back from the Lake District to find a letter from Alice waiting for me. No, not one, but two letters.’ Daniel flung himself into a chair and covered his face with his hands. ‘To think of darling Alice actually having the courage to leave that monster and then finding she had nowhere to go. Oh, what she must have been through!’ He looked up at Rachel. ‘I rushed round here. At first she flew into my arms – but when I told her not to worry, everything would now be all right, she wrenched herself away and said she was returning to, to, oh, I cannot say it.’ He rose and strode over to the window, his hands thrust deep into his trouser pockets. ‘Now she has locked herself into her room and says we must never see each other again.’

Rachel looked again at Ursula. ‘Is this really so?’

‘I am afraid it is.’ She added, ‘I think if Mr Rokeby were to leave, your sister might talk to you.’

‘I won’t go,’ Daniel said, still staring out of the window. ‘Not until I speak to her again.’

Rachel rubbed her forehead in despair. Underneath that air of fragile sweetness, her darling sister was one of the most obstinate creatures she knew. Then she said, ‘Daniel, go! So long as you are here, Alice will not communicate with us.’

More protestations followed. Eventually he took his hat and said, ‘Rachel, she needs me. She has only to send word and I will come, though it be from the ends of the earth!’

Why did Daniel always have to be so dramatic? thought Rachel.

As soon as he had departed, Ursula took her upstairs and she knocked on Alice’s door, ‘Darling, it’s me. Daniel has gone; please let me in.’

A key turned and a moment later Alice was in her arms.

After half an hour or so, Rachel accompanied her sister to the parlour; she carried Alice’s bag. Ursula was waiting.

‘I can talk no sense into her,’ Rachel said despairingly.

‘You do not listen to me,’ said Alice, equally despairing. She sat down and looked at Ursula. ‘Perhaps I can make you understand?’

Rachel saw the other girl sit beside her sister and take her hand. ‘Please try.’

Her breast filled with a ferment of strange emotions. She went over to the window and stood as Daniel had. It looked as though Alice had become very friendly with Ursula. Rachel told herself it was ridiculous to feel jealous. No one could come between her and Alice. But nothing of what her sister had said to her upstairs explained her decision.

‘You see,’ Alice said to Ursula. ‘Joshua and I had a son, Henry. He died of scarlet fever two years ago.’ Her voice wobbled. Rachel knew what saying this was doing to her and had to force herself to listen. ‘He was nearly three, such a darling, so funny, so loving. Never was there a lovelier child than Harry.’

Rachel could see the boy now in her mind’s eye. Fair curls, blue eyes with such a sparkle, and so mischievous. Even Joshua had been in thrall to him. With his son, he had shown warmth and a softness Rachel had not known he possessed.

‘When I fainted the other day, I suspected I might be with child again. I visited my doctor and today it was confirmed.’ That much of what Alice had said to her, Rachel had understood. She turned and watched the two girls.

‘Is …’ Ursula started and then stopped as though uncertain how to continue.

‘Yes, Mr Peters is the father and … and I cannot deny him this second chance for a family. He was as distraught as I when Henry went to heaven.’

Rachel could not stand it. ‘By his behaviour to you, he has forfeited any right to such happiness,’ she said bitterly.

‘Darling, you must understand,’ Alice pleaded.

For a moment there was silence.

Ursula rose. ‘You have to do what you believe is right,’ she said quietly. ‘I will go and find a cab.’

Rachel felt she had had the initiative removed from her and was filled with helplessness. In this mood Alice was unreachable.

Before they arrived at Montagu Place, Rachel said, quietly, ‘Are you certain Joshua is the father of this child?’

Alice looked at her with a curious expression. ‘Why do you doubt it? You cannot imagine that Daniel and I … that we …’

‘But you say you love him?’

‘I do! I never knew I could feel this way. I fought it, I knew it was wrong; then I came to believe that something that felt so right could not be wrong. That afternoon, amongst all those wild animals, I knew I had to be with him.’ She fell silent for a moment and Rachel envied the look she saw on her face. Then Alice added, ‘Even then, though, I knew we had to wait until I had left Joshua.’

‘But even loving Daniel you allowed Joshua in your bed!’

‘He is my husband,’ Alice said quietly. ‘I could not refuse him.’

Rachel just stopped herself from saying that she doubted Joshua had asked. He would have taken what he saw as his right. As in law it was.

Rachel was not a virgin. She had seen it as her duty as a modern woman to understand the act of ‘making love’. Gossip and wide reading told her that it was not something that had to be confined to marriage. The man she had chosen was attractive, she had approached the act with both curiosity and excitement, found it curiously unmoving, and soon severed the relationship. Her lover had been affronted. ‘You have no soul,’ he’d said. ‘No heart. You are frigid.’

‘How will you persuade Joshua to take you back? You know how vindictive he can be.’

‘I will tell him the truth. That I had to escape his cruel behaviour towards me. But that now we have the chance, if he is willing, of once again being a family.’

‘You cannot believe that he will change, not after you have humiliated him by leaving his roof.’

‘He can say that I am in a delicate condition and lost my mind for a little, that I have required medical treatment. The servants will accept that. And so will everyone else.’

‘Daniel won’t.’

‘Please, Rachel, that is over – it must be over. You must not mention his name again to me ever.’ Alice gripped her sister’s arm with fierce force. ‘Promise me you will persuade him that that is so.’ Her eyes looked compellingly into Rachel’s.

‘Oh, darling, he will never believe me.’

‘He must!’

They had arrived at Montagu Place. Rachel helped Alice down and prepared to follow her into the house.

‘Please, go home. I am very grateful to you for coming with me but I need to be on my own now,’ Alice said.

Rachel looked into her pale face and knew there was nothing she could say that would sway her obstinate sister. ‘I don’t understand how you can come back here.’ She’d wanted to be loving and supportive; instead her words sounded cold. With despair, she watched her sister’s small, stiffly upright figure disappear into the house.

* * *

Back in St George’s Square, Rachel could not find Martha. Instead she went through to the mews.

John’s automobile was not on the cobblestones and the doors to the converted stable where it was kept were closed. She stood on tiptoe and looked through the windows set high in the doors. With relief, she saw that the vehicle was inside. She banged on the door that led to the living quarters above. Almost immediately there came the sound of footsteps on the stairs. As he opened the door, Rachel fell into his arms. ‘Oh, John, John,’ she moaned. ‘She’s gone back to him.’

He held her close. ‘There, there; come and tell me all about it.’

The comfortable thing about John was that he did not believe in dramatic gestures. They’d made friends when she had come into the mews one day and saw him fiddling with that auto-car or automobile. These vehicles were becoming more and more common. There was even an Automobile Club. But up until that point, Rachel had had no chance to experience one at close quarters and immediately went over.

She had at first taken the young man for a chauffeur, employed by one of the St George’s Square residents. She had had no hesitation in approaching him and exclaiming with wonder at the machine. With its paintwork beautifully polished, the spokes of the wheels painted to match and the brass work gleaming, the vehicle was a compelling sight.