Broken Music (7 page)

‘I'm sure you mean well, but I really don't want to hear any more. It was an accident that should never have happened, but it was long ago. Can't we be allowed to forget?'

He suddenly stepped in front of her, so that she was forced to stop. ‘Miss Wentworth, don't you
want
to know the truth?' he asked, and heard the intake of her breath.

The truth? What was he insinuating? That Marianne's tragic death had
not
been an accident? That the old, crumbling jetty by the boathouse had not collapsed under her weight so that she'd been unable to save herself? That it had been deliberate? Marianne, creeping out at night, jumping into the black waters of the lake to drown herself? Never! She had been so happy those last few weeks. Glowing from all the attention, aware perhaps for the first time of her sexual attraction. It had changed her, certainly, made her secretive and even a little distanced from Nella for the first time in their lives, but not even remotely in a way that indicated she might choose to take her life.

‘What do you mean, the truth? It was unbearably hot that night. The coolest place in the village was down by the lake. I've no doubt my sister couldn't sleep and that's why she went down there.' She was aware how lame that sounded. Well-brought-up young ladies rarely went out alone, late at night or otherwise.

He said deliberately, ‘If that was so, I don't suppose she was the only one out in the cool of the evening. But nobody ever came forward to say they'd seen her.'

‘The lake is on private land. The only people likely to have been around are those who had no business to be there. Why don't you ask the Gypsies? They're back again, down in the Leasowes. Goodbye, Mr Reardon.'

He stood back, and let her go. A few minutes later, already halfway to Oaklands, she heard the diminuendo of his motorcycle engine on the quiet air.

 

She was late for duty by now, and without realising what she was doing, she found herself taking the dreaded short cut past the lake: the path her sister had taken that last night. But her mind was now so full of the vivid, painfully resurrected recollections of those last days before Marianne died that it scarcely mattered.

Not that the whole of that golden, carefree summer had ever been too far from her thoughts since its terrible, unthinkable ending…

1914

Or had they all been golden, those pre-war days? It had seemed so. Tennis. Croquet on the Oaklands lawn. Tea under the big cedar, and Grev plucking the strings of a lute. Summer muslins and one's hair up for the first time. Echoes of laughter. Lying on the grass in the hot sun. Wandering down to the lake in the valley because it was cooler there, surrounded as it was by the dense pines and the tall red sandstone cliff which threw a black shade onto the water, and from which Rupert made those spectacular dives. Long, endless days, unspooling like silken thread as though they would go on for ever.

But like a nub in the silk was the appearance of the Gypsy boy. He was seventeen or eighteen, perhaps, though it was difficult to tell exactly, his tribe generally being wiry and not tall in stature. He was usually barefoot, wearing cut-down breeches and a red handkerchief knotted round his neck, with straight black hair and deep-set eyes, as lean and brown-skinned as if he'd been carved from some tree, a savage, mangy dog or two at his heels. Wherever they were, the crowd of them, there he seemed to be, too, going about his business, whatever that might be, just beyond the periphery of the activities of their charmed circle, although in actual fact his presence didn't really bother any of them, except Rupert.

 

Long before his arrival at the rectory, Rupert had been the object of much interested speculation by the girls, especially by Amy. At thirteen, she was just becoming aware of young men and the impression she made on them. ‘Rupert von Kessel. How romantic. Do you suppose he speaks English?'

‘Of course he speaks English, you goose!' Nella had laughed. ‘He was at Rugby with William for five or six years, so it isn't likely he wouldn't.'

‘Well, William's been over to stay with Rupert's family in Salzburg and
he
doesn't speak German!'

‘He'd hardly do that, after only a few weeks, would he? I don't suppose this Rupert wears lederhosen, either. Though he looks as though he might.'

‘What are lederhosen?

‘Leather shorts with braces, worn by hearty types who stride over the mountains grasping an alpenstock—'

‘What's—?'

‘Nella, don't tease the child,' said Marianne.

Amy tossed her head. ‘It doesn't matter.
I
think he's very handsome.' She gazed at the photograph William had sent: brownish, inexpertly hand-tinted, so that Rupert's hair was bright yellow, his cheeks an unnatural shade of pink. But it didn't disguise the fact that he was tall and well made, very much the same build as William, most probably athletic like him, too, a product of school games, at which they had both excelled.

‘Sorry, Amy dear, I
was
only teasing – but he looks too boring to me.' Nella remained unimpressed. She thought the photograph, a family group taken at Rupert's home in Salzburg the previous year, one of the times when William had stayed with them, was typical of what she imagined Austrians to be – stuffy and stiff-necked, Rupert's two older sisters as elaborately dressed as if for a royal garden party, sitting as if they had pokers down their backs; his brother, a dashing cavalry officer, resplendent in a scarlet and gold-braided uniform straight out of a musical comedy. His mother was extremely fat, and his father grim and unsmiling.

‘And I'm
not
a child,' Amy said, still gazing at the photograph. ‘Why do you two always think me such a baby? You're just as bad as me anyway, Marianne. You hope Rupert will carry you off back to his castle in Austria and make passionate love to you and—'

Marianne, who was never angry, stood stock-still, white-faced. ‘You've been prying into my notebook!'

‘No…I…it wasn't prying.' Amy was suddenly frightened. ‘You left it open on the parlour desk…and I just…happened to see it.'

‘Now, Amy, that's a fib for a start,' Nella said.

Marianne kept her notebooks in a private box in a drawer in her room and
never
left them lying around. She had never let anyone read them, either, except Mrs Rafferty, and not her lately. She had long ago stopped telling stories to her sisters. She said nothing more, however, except, very quietly, ‘Don't ever do that again, Amy. Ever. Do you hear me?'

 

Rupert, in fact, turned out to possess a kind of devil-may-care charm, and to be even more handsome than his photograph. He had acquired a patina of Englishness during his several years of public school education– where his father, a rich banker, had sent him because he had business interests in England and thought an English education for his son would be a distinct advantage to him– and his accent had by now almost disappeared, unless you listened very carefully. Nothing could quite disguise the fact, however, that he was not an Englishman born and bred, though to do him justice, he never tried to make anyone believe he was. He was very obviously exceedingly proud to be a member of the great Austro-Hungarian Empire, and on occasions it even seemed to amuse him to make himself appear more foreign than he really was, to emphasise his foreignness with wry remarks, and cultivate a slightly ironic tone and a dry self-mockery.

Nella saw that it made life more comfortable to pretend to laugh at oneself before others could do it, but she thought the habit quite irritating: it underlined things you might not have noticed if they hadn't been forced upon your attention, but she kept her opinions to herself. He was her brother's friend, and it was bad enough that in the current climate of opinion, the guest at the rectory was already being looked on with suspicion, by the villagers, and most of the local gentry. Von Kessel, what sort of name was that? Probably German, a sympathiser with the Kaiser, and who wanted to be on friendly terms with
him
, the way he was acting? Arming Germany to the teeth, picking quarrels with his cousin, the King. What was that…not German, but Austrian, this young fellow? Well, what was the difference, when the two nations were thick as thieves?

But in actual fact, Nella had good reason for being quite glad of the diversion his visit brought about, hoping it might draw the attention from her. She was not in her grandmother's good books at that moment by her refusal to comply with the suggestion their aunt had made quite suddenly one evening after supper at Oaklands. Would it not be a good thing, she asked, if Nella and Marianne should share Eunice's coming-out functions in London the next year? She, Lady Sybil, had already put several arrangements in hand. There would be Eunice's big dance to attend and invitations to other innumerable social events, with all the advantages that would bring the girls. Marianne had only smiled at the suggestion and murmured vaguely, ‘How kind, dear Aunt,' which meant nothing except that she would not commit herself before considering all the possibilities and deciding what to say.

Nella, however, was too horrified to be tactful. The very idea made her feel as though all the air had been sucked from her body so that she could not breathe. Before stopping to think, she had cried out, ‘Oh no, absolutely not! I simply can't
imagine
anything I should detest more.'

‘Fenella!' said her grandmother, shocked.

‘I'm…I'm sorry.' And, belatedly, she was. She knew her outburst would be seen as ingratitude for all that Aunt Sybil and Uncle Foley had done for them.

But their aunt only smiled and shrugged her slim shoulders. Her one great beauty was her eyes, almond-shaped, thickly lashed and of a darkness that seemed to reflect the colours of the elegant dresses she wore, so that one could never be quite sure what colour they were. She was wearing a simple topaz silk that particular evening, and her eyes were flecked with pinpoints of golden light. Nella hoped it wasn't a danger signal; she and her aunt had crossed swords on occasions before now. Lady Sybil was inclined to sweep everything and everyone before her in her enthusiasms, and she did not like to be opposed – and this coming out of Eunice's was the road to getting her married off, which she was as inflexible in her determination to achieve as any other society mother. But Nella had learnt early that if you stood up to her, Sybil bore you no ill will and perhaps liked you better for it. ‘No need to apologise, child. I like a girl with spirit.' She laughed, her warm, rich laugh, and Nella released her breath. ‘Though you might be sorry later,' she added. ‘Most girls would jump at the opportunity.'

Most girls, perhaps. London for the season, glittering social occasions and beautiful clothes (all generously and willingly provided for them by Uncle Foley, presumably, who was rich as Croesus, and had already provided them with too much, which was another reason Nella hated the idea).

‘Oh, I believe Nella will come round, Sybil, when she's had a chance to think about it,' Mrs Villiers said, with her eyes severely on Nella, steely for once in her determination that this chance should not be rejected.

Nella, however, vowed to stand her ground. She had no intentions of being cajoled, nor even influenced by the pleas of poor little Eunice, who was as horrified at the prospect as Nella herself.

‘Do say yes, Nella! You can't think how much I admire you for refusing, but it would mean so much to me if both of you were to join me,' she begged. All those parties and dances would be sheer torture to her, she would be expected to make herself pleasant and agreeable to various strange young men in order to catch one of them as a husband; or worse, she would be a failure, and come out of her first season having failed to catch any of them.

Nella thought that Eunice's shrinking from this sort of exposure might be a chief factor influencing Lady Sybil's offer to herself and her sister: that with the support of her two dearest friends, Eunice would be sure to find the courage to plunge into the social whirl and find it was not so painful after all. As she constantly reiterated, Eunice wasn't the first girl to be terrified at such a prospect, but as far as she was aware, none had ever been destroyed by it yet.

‘I'm sorry, Marianne,' Nella said later, ‘I'm too impetuous, I've probably spoilt your chances, too.' It had belatedly occurred to her that her sister might, after all, not see things in the same light as she did, might in fact quite welcome the idea of going to parties and being surrounded by young men, which she undoubtedly would be. There was no doubt she had lately come to enjoy being the centre of attraction. Amy might not have been so far wrong, after all, in suggesting their romantic sister was dreaming of a prince who would capture her heart and carry her off. But Marianne just smiled composedly and told Nella to leave it be for the time being, things had a habit of working themselves out if you let events take their course.

‘What was that man doing here, Francis?' asked Mrs Villiers, that same afternoon, coming into his study.

Francis, startled by the rapid knock on his door and the entry of his mother-in-law, was for the moment nonplussed. ‘Er…what man?'

His pretence was ludicrous, as if he had so many visitors that he could not remember – he, who still had few callers, even among his parishioners, perhaps especially among them. After working in the rarefied atmosphere of the cathedral precincts, she knew that he found the duties of a parish priest difficult, though she had begun to hope that he was beginning to be accepted. The work itself was not demanding. St Ethelfleda's parishioners had never been enamoured of the genuflexions, lace-on-the-altar and incense-swinging, otherworldly ministry of Father Dorkings – nor of the parson before him, who had never been able to offer much comfort or practical advice – and had therefore learnt not to expect too much of their incumbent. Most of them asked for little more than a sermon on Sunday, marriages, christenings and burials. The occasions which demanded most of him lately – and to do him justice he did not seek to shirk the burden – had been when he had to call on wives and mothers whose husbands and sons had been lost in the trenches, or at sea.

Eleanor knew her son-in-law had never been amenable to her plain speaking; it made him retreat into his shell, but there was no way to put what she had to say gently. ‘Come, Francis, you know very well I meant that man Reardon, the detective who was sent here when…when Marianne was found. He was here not an hour ago.'

Francis had been writing something in a large notebook with stiff covers and now he blotted his last words, carefully rested his pen on the inkstand on his desk, and folded his long, shapely hands, giving himself a moment before replying.

‘Florrie didn't recognise him,' Eleanor went on. ‘And she wouldn't have let him in, since he refused to state his name or his business, had it not been for…' She stopped and began again. ‘He had very obviously been in the war.'

Florrie had believed him to be someone come upon hard times, reduced to begging, or selling matches on street corners, like so many more in these difficult days, when the number of unemployed was beginning to assume frightening proportions. The disillusion with the government was creeping through the whole country and had percolated even as far as Broughton Underhill – a sense of outrage that rehabilitation for men and boys broken in the war and opportunity for everyone were not happening. It did not help to be told that the war for which they had given up so much had nearly bankrupted the nation. The promised land, a fairer and more equal life for everyone, was as much a mirage as it had ever been.

‘No,' Francis said with a sigh, ‘Florrie would not recognise him. He has been terribly wounded about the face.'

‘Yes, Francis, I saw that. I spoke to him. Poor man…' she said softly, and paused, before going on spiritedly, ‘nevertheless, that doesn't excuse what he intends to do. He must be told to leave at once. We cannot have him going round the village, asking questions. Opening old sores,' she added more quietly, looking at his face with pity. This silent, haggard man was not the son-in-law she had once known, the man her daughter Dorothea had fallen in love with and adored. He had always been startlingly handsome, in that dark, ascetic way. She had, sometimes, in the old days, thought him a little vain. But now…

‘How do you know this? When did you speak to him?' he asked.

‘Florrie told me about him when she came back from answering the door. I was curious and I made it my business to be out in the garden as he left. There are still a few late snowdrops under the trees by the gate, and I stayed searching for them so that he would be bound to pass me. But…Francis, after you let him out and closed the door, he went looking for her grave and stood there until I went over to him. I asked him his business, and he told me something I find quite extraordinary. That although he is not yet back in his job with the police, for some reason I could not fathom he is making further enquiries into what happened to Marianne…I imagine I am telling you something you already know, of course. He must have told you the same thing.'

‘Did he tell you why?'

‘Exactly what I asked him.' She hesitated, then added quietly, ‘He seems to think that it was no accident. But we all know that it was, don't we? Which is what I told him.'

‘Do we know that? How do we know?'

She looked at his ravaged face with pity, paused for a moment and then said plainly, ‘Are you suggesting that your daughter would commit suicide, Francis?
Marianne?
'

Quite apart from suicide being regarded as a sin in some quarters, it was a tragedy that always left guilt behind it – those who were left asking why. Had it in some way been their fault? What could they have done to prevent it?

He said, ‘Maybe that is something we shall have to learn to accept. Maybe it is God's will that we should ask ourselves why.'

Not for the first time, Mrs Villiers wondered if Francis was not a man who welcomed the burden of guilt on his shoulders, shouldering it until he sagged beneath its weight.

 

The day on the ward was as busy as Nella had predicted, and even more of a strain because, try as she would, she could not keep her mind entirely on what she was doing. Despite being so late, it had been a mistake to take the short cut to Oaklands, past the lake, but even if she had not, the memories could now no longer be shut out, not after that conversation with Reardon. As she mechanically performed her duties, took her meal breaks, joked with the patients, they crowded in on her: people, things she had forgotten, some things she never would forget…