All Change: Cazalet Chronicles (66 page)
Read All Change: Cazalet Chronicles Online
Authors: Elizabeth Jane Howard
Tags: #Sagas, #General, #Fiction
All the while Rachel was telling the servants that Mr Hugh had had a heart attack and she needed to go to London early next morning – would Tonbridge drive her, and would Eileen help her pack a case this evening? – she felt completely in command. She had obtained leave for the Tonbridges to stay in their cottage until the end of the month, and suggested that they took Eileen in, to help with cleaning the house. After that, and after Mrs Tonbridge had had her operation, she had found two possible cottages to rent in Battle. She had the three months’ rent ready on whichever they might choose. But, of course, she would be in touch with them as soon as she found out the situation with Mr Hugh.
Mrs Tonbridge was speechless with emotion. Rachel had never seen her near tears before, and Eileen asked whether this meant that Miss Rachel would not be coming back to the house. For the first time she realised that she probably wouldn’t. However, she said nothing, just asked for a plain omelette for her supper. Then she would pack and have an early night; she wanted to leave as soon after eight as possible.
Of course it will be my last night here, she thought. Better to have it like this, without my moaning and grieving and making the worst of it. I have Hugh to worry about now, and Jemima – and poor little Laura come to that.
All the same, after her supper, and packing with Eileen, and saying goodnight to her, she got into her dressing gown and walked slowly through all the rooms upstairs. There was the Brig’s dressing room, where he had slept because his snoring was of a volume that even the loyal Duchy could not endure. The room where Sybil had had Simon and lost his twin, where Sybil had died, her own room where Clary, so lonely, had come to sleep on her bedroom floor. Then she summoned the courage to enter the Duchy’s room where she had peacefully gone, and the room where her darling Sid had spent her last weeks.
She had always been the recipient of confidences -even this Christmas there had been one that shocked and disturbed her. She had found Louise weeping on the attic stairs. ‘Oh, Aunt Rach, I don’t know how to bear it, but I know now that I must.’ It turned out that she had been having an affair with a married man who, she had now realised, would never leave his wife.
So she must leave him – get over it, somehow. Her misery was so intense that Rachel had stopped feeling shocked and simply gone to comfort her. Louise was doing the right thing, she said; the unhappiness would eventually go away, and she would find someone more worthy to love her.
Sid’s room was still full of her things. Rachel took the little woolly hat she used to wear when her hair was falling out, and the long silk scarf that had been her last present. Tomorrow she would tell Eileen to clear everything else and give it to a charity. From the nursery she took a box of dominoes, and
The Brown Fairy Book
, her favourite when she had been a child; she had coloured all the black and white Henry Ford illustrations; all the princesses had long golden hair and the dragons were bright green. She would be able to read it to Laura now, and also teach her to play dominoes.
Then she went to bed, in her own room, which Villy had left immaculate. She knew she was tired, as her back was hurting, but she felt infinitely warm from all the love she’d received. And now – better still – she was going to be needed.
ALSO BY ELIZABETH JANE HOWARD
Love All
The Beautiful Visit
The Long View
The Sea Change
After Julius
Odd Girl Out
Something in Disguise
Getting It Right
Mr Wrong
Falling
The Cazalet Chronicles
The Light Years
Marking Time
Confusion
Casting Off
Non-Fiction
The Lover’s Companion
Green Shades
Slipstream
First published 2013 by Mantle
an imprint of Pan Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited
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Basingstoke and Oxford
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www.panmacmillan.com
ISBN 978-1-4472-4717-3
Copyright © Elizabeth Jane Howard 2013
The right of Elizabeth Jane Howard to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
You may not copy, store, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
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Table of Contents
PART THREE July–September 1956
PART FOUR December 1956–January 1957
PART SEVEN November–December 1957