Glittering Images (20 page)

‘It all ended on a Saturday in September 1918. After breakfast I was just starting work on Sunday’s sermon when a wire arrived to say that Lady Starmouth’s favourite brother had been killed in action and could I go down to Leatherhead immediately. As you must have discovered by now, that’s where the Starmouths have their country home; they have no connection with the city of Starmouth in this diocese beyond the fact that the first Earl’s mother was born there and when he was offered his earldom he decided it would be less embarrassing to be called Lord Starmouth than Lord Leatherhead. Loretta used to like that story – Americans are always so ingenuously intrigued by titles … She was there, of course, with her friend when I arrived at Starmouth Court later that morning. She’d caught an earlier train from London.

‘I talked to Lady Starmouth on her own for a while and then we all lunched together. The Earl wasn’t there; he was on his way back from Scotland and wasn’t expected until much later. After luncheon Lady Starmouth decided to rest and I was about to consider my return to London when Loretta said she had something to tell me and I fell in with her suggestion that we should go for a walk down into the valley. The Starmouths’ house is built on a hillside overlooking the River Mole – but perhaps you know that? I’ve just remembered that you come from that part of Surrey, don’t you, and so you’ve probably often passed the house – it’s visible from the main road between Leatherhead and Dorking.’

Jardine paused, his eyes dark with memory, his hands clasped tightly as he leaned forward on his desk. ‘We walked to the river,’ he said. ‘We walked back. It was the first time we’d ever been alone together, far from other people. There was traffic on the road – pony-traps, cyclists, even a motor, but we were alone. Then she told me everything and the friendship ended.’ He paused again before adding abruptly, ‘She cried a lot. When we got back Lady Starmouth was downstairs. She took one look at Loretta and guessed everything – which in a way was a good thing because she was able to help us both. She helped Loretta get a passage to America, an almost impossible feat in wartime, and she helped me by never once offering a word of reproach. But of course by that time I could see how deeply I’d failed Loretta as a pastor, and so I knew far better than Lady Starmouth how very, very much I was to blame …’

I allowed a moment of sympathetic silence to elapse before venturing the comment: ‘I can certainly understand why you made no further experiments in platonic friendship.’

‘I realize that you find the whole concept of platonic friendship fantastic, but then you’re a member of the sex-obsessed post-War generation. In my young day a wider range of malefemale relationships was possible … But I don’t mean to make excuses for myself. I did make terrible mistakes with Loretta.’

‘But not scandalous ones. There were no letters, I suppose, Bishop?’

‘Not after she’d declared her feelings, no. We’d had some harmless correspondence earlier but I burnt it.’

‘No entries in the journal?’

‘Fortunately I had no pressing need to pour out my remorse on paper because I was able to pour it out to Lady Starmouth instead.’

A thought struck me. ‘Did you confide in your stepmother?’

‘Ah!’ Jardine gave a wry smile. ‘I did tell her much later at the end of her life, but in 1918 I said nothing. My stepmother had made such a fuss when I married that I avoided talking to her about my women-friends … Dear me, how possessive that makes her sound! Let me at once correct that unfortunate impression by saying that she always wanted me to marry but unfortunately her idea of a suitable wife for me was quite different from my own. That’s not an uncommon dilemma for mothers and sons to find themselves in, I believe.’ He leant back in his chair with another smile. ‘Well, Dr Ashworth? Is the last chink in my armour finally sealed?’

‘I think that as far as the press are concerned you really must be impregnable.’

‘And apart from the press?’

‘Oh, you have your Achilles heel, of course,’ I said, rising to my feet, ‘but fortunately the way to protect yourself there is very simple. May I suggest you start looking around without delay for a new companion to replace Miss Christie?’ And as the smile vanished from his face I made a swift exit into the hall.

So now I knew the story of Loretta. Or, to be accurate, I now knew Jardine’s version of the story of Loretta, an account which harmonized dutifully with the account of Lady Starmouth. Of course he had not told me everything; I was prepared to bet there had been a kiss or two by the river in the intervals between the passing pony-traps which he had mentioned so carefully, but nevertheless I suspected he had been reasonably honest with me. A kiss between a married clergyman and a passionate young woman certainly represented the sort of indiscretion Lang had feared, but so far as I could see there could be no conceivable danger to Jardine now, nineteen years later, particularly since no one but Lady Starmouth and old Mrs Jardine had ever known the friendship had gone so wrong.

I was genuinely pleased that Jardine was impregnable from scandal yet at the same time I was unforgivably disappointed that I still had no excuse to think the unthinkable; a minor indiscretion, even though reprehensible, was a long way from a major moral error. My disappointment baffled me. I felt it was irrational that I should want to unmask as an apostate a man I so much admired, and I began to wonder if my two personalities were subtly at war with each other. However that was a mad thought which could not be entertained for more than the briefest of moments, and thrusting it aside I retired to my room to plot my next move.

It was now Friday. I had assumed I would have to leave on the following morning, but since Jardine had been gentleman enough to stand by the invitation in his letter I thought it would be churlish of me not to stay on. Besides I was never a man who wasted his opportunities, and the extension of my visit would give me the chance to see more of Lyle.

Taking a sheet of the palace notepaper from the drawer of the table I sat down and wrote, ‘My dear Bishop, Of course I’d consider it a great honour to assist you at Holy Communion and a great pleasure to remain at the palace. Thank you for your continuing hospitality which in the circumstances I find impressively generous. Yours most sincerely, Charles Ashworth.’

But I wondered if he were already regretting his invitation.

The day proved frustrating because I had no chance to see Lyle on her own. After leaving the Bishop’s letter on the hall table I made another nominal attempt to work in the Cathedral library but when I returned to the palace I was informed that Lyle had accompanied Mrs Jardine to the station to meet the new guests who were arriving to replace the Starmouths.

There were hordes of people at lunch. I counted eighteen places laid at the extended dining-room table and soon discovered, to my disgust, that Lyle and I had been placed six seats apart. Moreover as soon as the last visitor had departed she and Mrs Jardine drove off to open a church bazaar and I was left still debating whether I had been the victim of a conspiracy. Wandering moodily around the town to pass the time, I browsed in the antiquarian bookshops and finally succeeded in attending Choral Evensong.

The guests at dinner were confined to those who were staying at the palace. The new arrivals, four cousins of Mrs Jardine, seemed incapable of talking about anything except fox-hunting, and I could see Jardine was missing Lady Starmouth’s sophisticated glamour. However after the cloth was drawn the lay guests were successfully dispatched to the smoking-room and he was able to cheer himself up by discussing the Virgin Birth with me. As I had suspected, he believed in the creed
ex animo
and in his own Modernist way was thoroughly orthodox.

We returned to the drawing-room. Lyle was on duty by the coffee-pot but the Bishop came with me to collect his cup and obstinately refused to take a turn on the terrace with any of the ladies. Possibly he felt all the female guests were too plain to be worthy of such attention, but possibly too he was determined to keep me from enjoying a private word with Lyle.

‘Come and sit down, Dr Ashworth!’ called Mrs Jardine, patting the vacant space on the sofa beside her as she presided among her elderly female cousins. ‘We all want to hear more about Dr Lang!’

I suddenly decided I was the victim of a conspiracy. ‘I’m just coming!’ I called back, and said swiftly to Lyle as the Bishop looked on, ‘What are you doing tomorrow?’

‘I’m going out for the day with Mrs Jardine. She wants to take her cousins to the sea.’

‘Dine with me when you get back.’

She hesitated but the Bishop said briskly, ‘Give yourself an evening off, Lyle, and accept the invitation – unless, of course, you feel Dr Ashworth so blotted his copybook at Starbury Ring that you don’t wish to go out with him again. If that’s the case then you’d do much better to be frank and tell him so.’

‘Thank you, Bishop,’ I said. I turned to Lyle. Think about it,’ I said, ‘and let me know.’ And leaving her sheltering behind the coffee-pot I joined Mrs Jardine to recall my most flattering memories of Dr Lang.

The next morning I awoke after another turbulent night to find that a note had been slipped under my door.

‘I shall be free from seven-thirty onwards this evening,’ Lyle had written in a small precise hand. ‘If you’re uncertain where to dine, may I recommend the Staro Arms in Eternity Street? L. C.’

I decided I had imagined the conspiracy.

Or had I?

I wondered what the Bishop was thinking.

I spent the day forcing myself to work on my St Anselm notes until I reached the point where I could conclude my researches in the University Library at Cambridge. Afterwards, relieved to the point of frivolity, I scribbled experimentally on my notepad and having produced three absurd verses I returned from the Cathedral to the palace where I copied my lines on to a sheet of notepaper.

‘There was a young lady named Lyle (I wrote)

Who wanted to run half a mile

Whenever Charles A

Said: ‘Is there a way

You can care for me more, dearest Lyle?’

‘There was a smart bishop named Jardine

Whose name only rhymes with a sardine.

He said: ‘Go far away,

You bad Dr A,

And leave Lyle to serve Mrs Jardine!’

‘There was a canon called Ashworth from Laud’s

Who aspired to the best life affords.

He knew to win Lyle

He must exercise guile,

So he tried hard to lure her to Laud’s.’

Underneath this last line I wrote: ‘Sorry this isn’t a sonnet, but unfortunately not all clergymen can rival John Donne. Why don’t you take a few days’ holiday and visit Cambridge soon? Have you ever been punting on the Cam? Have you ever seen King’s College Chapel? Have you ever watched the sun set over the Backs? There’s a world beyond Starbridge, and I think it’s time someone reminded you of it.’ Signing my Christian name I added my telephone number before concluding: ‘P. S. Bring Mrs Jardine too, if you feel you can’t leave her. Why not? The change would do her good.’

Having demolished her most obvious excuse for refusing my invitation I raided the garden for a rose and retired once more to the house. It was mid-afternoon. Jardine was out and Mrs Jardine’s party had not yet returned from the excursion to the sea. The butler was probably much surprised when someone rang the bell in the drawing-room, but when he appeared he had his sepulchral expression firmly in place and never even faltered at the sight of the rose in my hand.

‘I want to leave this in Miss Christie’s room, Shipton,’ I said, watching for any sign that might indicate the servants regarded Lyle as hopelessly out of bounds to all admirers. ‘How do I get there?’

However Shipton seemed delighted by the prospect of a romance and possibly even more delighted by the prospect of a romance which was inevitably doomed. His sepulchral expression softened; his voice became confidential. ‘Miss Christie’s room is a little difficult to find, sir. Allow me to show you the way.’

We made a dignified journey upstairs, I bearing the rose, Shipton bearing his modified sepulchral expression, and I was led through a labyrinth of gothic corridors to a remote room high in the south turret.

‘New servants must need a map to get here!’ I remarked as he opened the door.

‘Miss Christie likes to give the Bishop and Mrs Bishop every privacy, sir, as befits a lady in her position who lives as one of the family. Will that be all, sir, or shall I wait to show you the way back?’

‘No, I’ll find my own way back, thank you, Shipton, but if I don’t return within twelve hours you can organize a search-party.’

‘Very good, sir.’ He padded away with his gravity intact, and I walked into the room.

It was a high bright octagon, adorned sparingly with an unremarkable collection of furniture. Among the collection was a single bed, covered with a blue counterpane, and on the bedside table was the Penguin edition of Hemingway’s
A Farewell to Arms
together with a faded photograph of a bright-eyed soldier in uniform. There was something unbearably poignant about his air of hope and vigour. On the dressing-table stood some silver brushes, a modest tray of make-up and a jam-jar of honeysuckle from the garden. Three pictures hung on the walls, a watercolour of a lake which could have been one of the Norfolk Broads, a framed sketch of a large Georgian townhouse which I suspected was the Deanery at Radbury, and a first-class engraving of the matchless Starbridge Cathedral. I stood there absorbing the scene so that I would be able to picture her in her seclusion when I was far away in Cambridge, and then I laid the rose on her pillow, took the verses from my pocket and left the folded paper beneath the rose’s long stem.