Once Upon A Winter (31 page)

‘Hurry up,’ said Joshua, ‘take off your coat and boots and come sit down.’

‘Very well,’ Silas muttered eventually, glancing warily at Nell as if he were somehow in danger himself this time round. ‘If you’re sure.’

Joshua
jabbered away all through dinner, which took the pressure off Nell. She ran the gamut of emotions from joyful through to despondent; the latter arising from interrogating herself as to why she was even the former.

She was confused, there was no denying it. Yet how could she be otherwise, after everything she now knew about her husband, if she co
uld even legally call him that?

There was a pile-up
of questions on her tongue, but she couldn’t ask them with Joshua present. And yet, Joshua was so much a part of it that she didn’t see how it would be possible to exclude him indefinitely.

At every opportunity, she furtively studied Silas. Each time, she reacted with disbelief.
How could he be who he said he was?

Surely h
e was just a man, as human as she was, and governed by the same limitations. And yet, he had hardly changed since their first meeting. Had scarcely altered from those photos in Calista’s sister’s wedding album. The aging process seemed to have hardly any effect on him. Some tiny flecks of grey around his hairline, barely noticeable, one or two extra little lines around his eyes . . . That seemed to be the extent of it.

And something else, too. There was a look in his eyes now that Nell was more easily able to define. Perhaps it had always been there, but in her innocence she had disregarded it. The look of someone with vast experience, knowledge and an inner
store of sorrow. The depth of someone far older, who had seen too much heartache and knew how much youth could truly be wasted on the young. Nell recognised it from her grandmother, and from Abe Golding.

‘Shall I ask Nana Gwen if she wants a cup of tea, and tell her Dad’s here?’ Joshua asked, as he laid his empty plate beside the sink, the meal over.

Nell glanced at Silas, who nodded.

‘OK,’ she said. ‘But try not to make it too much of a surprise. She’s very poorly at the moment.’

Joshua made a thumbs-up sign, and ran out.

Silas stood up and put his own plate beside the
sink. He turned to Nell. ‘Thank you for the meal. Your stews were always very . . . filling.’

‘That’s putting it politely. I’m still not a great cook, Silas. That much hasn’t changed.’

‘But a lot
has
changed,’ he said, rather earnestly. ‘Nell, are you ready to talk about what I told you the other day? I realise that it came as a great shock. It was always going to. There was no easy way to broach it. Calista was trying to be supportive. She told me that you went to hers after you left me at the church.’

‘I knew she’d tell you. But that’s OK. She was very helpful. And kind.’ Nell realised she was making her sound like a shop assistant, so she added, ‘Calista cares about you a lot, Silas. She’s very grateful for the way you made her sister happy at the end . . .’

Silas regarded Nell with a fresh reticence, but still he asked, ‘And how does that make you feel? Knowing about Lydia? And Violet and Alice?’

Nell shrugged, in an attempt to seem coolly indifferent. ‘Listen, Silas, most men your age -’ she stopped, and then backtracked, ‘I mean, most men who are the age you look as if you are - are going to have some sort of history. When we first met, you never kidded me you’d been a monk.
I knew there must have been girlfriends. “Relationships”. Of course I did. I know you weren’t exactly
forthcoming
on details, but I was well aware you had a past.’ Nell shrugged again. ‘Of course, if I’d known just how far back that past went or how spread out those relationships were . . .’

Silas blinked at her. ‘You’re turning it into a joke.’

‘For heaven’s sake, Silas!’ Nell’s brow shot up. ‘Just let me accept it and come to terms with it however it suits me. It’s a big ask.’

He instantly looked contrite. ‘I’m sorry. You’re right.’

‘And
you’re
right, too,’ Nell conceded. ‘We need to talk about all this. I’m just not sure when we’ll get the chance . . .’

‘How about right now? I
f you’ll let me, there’s something I want to show you.
Things
I want to show you. Memories I haven’t looked at myself in years. I want to share them with you . . . And Joshua.’

Nell paused,
her shoulders heaving in a sigh. ‘I don’t know, Silas . . . Josh is so young . . .’

‘He’s old enough. Trust me. He’ll accept it with ease, because he’ll know instinctively that it’s true. He is what he is, Nell.’

She ran a hand down the length of her ponytail. ’And what’s that exactly?’ she asked quietly, fearfully. ‘What will happen to him, Silas? Is he the same as you? And what about Freya - why isn’t she affected?’

‘Freya is as normal as you
. On the rare occasion when a twin is also born, they’re always female, and as ordinary as their mother. I can only ever have one heir.’

‘
As opposed to heir
ess
? But what I don’t understand . . . Why didn’t it happen sooner? Why didn’t one of your other wives get pregnant?’

‘It happens when it’s meant to. I didn’t choose you to bear my son. You remember, Nell, we were never actively trying to have a child.’

Nell could feel heat seeping through her face at the recollection. ‘Yes, OK, but no method of contraception is ever fool-proof anyway. We were “active” enough.’

Oh damn, why had she said that? Now she was even more flushed. She could complain about other aspects of their lovemaking, but never the regularity.

‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘I’d better get on with the washing up.’

‘Nell.’ Silas reached out and snatched her hand, drawing her away from the sink. ‘Don’t skirt around the issue. Joshua needs to know. He’ll go through adolescence like any other boy, but when he reaches manhood, everything w
ill slow down. He won’t age as fast as anyone else. And because of that, he won’t be able to stay in the same place for longer than a few years. Not permanently. He can’t put down roots. But that’s all right. He has enough to keep him occupied, wherever he goes.’

Nell pulled her hand away from Silas’s. She chewed on her thumbnail in agitation, then said, her voice choked, ‘That just sounds so lonely . . .’

‘It’s not as bad as you think. We’re not designed to bond the way you are.’

‘I think my son and I “bonded” very well from the start.’ Nell glared up at Silas. ‘And it seems to me that your father was pretty “bonded” to Anna Lambert.’

‘Exceptions,’ said Silas, avoiding eye contact with Nell. ‘You know what happened to my mother because of it.’

‘Because of some curse?’ Nell shook her head scathingly. ‘You believe that, do you?’

‘Why shouldn’t I? My father never lied to me about anything else. Our kind never settle. We’re not supposed to.’

‘So the women you end up with, on and off . . . those marriages - they’re just shams. A truckload of empty promises.’

‘It’s better that way. Believe me. If I gave anything of myself away, it would put them in danger.’

‘So they’d be even more doomed than dying of influenza or being hit by a bomb?’ Nell pointed out. ‘What are you so scared of, Silas? Feeling
loss
, like anyone else? Real grief? Contrary to whatever it was you felt when those poor women died. What if your father just said all that stuff about a curse because he wanted to protect you? To stop you getting close to anyone the way he had, and the possibility of feeling the same pain he went through.’

‘No.’ Silas shook his head vehemently. ‘No . . . it’s real. It makes sense. If we fall for a woman, we tie ourselves down. We watch her grow old without us, we -’

‘That doesn’t make sense at all,’ said Nell. ‘If they’re cursed, as you say, then they’re going to meet some sticky end sooner rather than later. They won’t even get a chance to grow old.’

‘Nell, you’re twisting my words. Tampering with my logic.’

‘You’re doing that yourself, Silas.’

There was a long pause.

‘So how old are you actually going to get?’ pressed Nell hotly. ‘How long will you live?’

‘I presume it will be the same as always. When our sons reach maturity, we begin to age like everyone else. We’re not immortal. After Joshua turns twenty, I’ll maybe live another forty or fifty years, if I’m fortunate. Since the children came along, anyway, I’ve begun to n
otice changes in me happening faster than they used to.’

‘So
, “curse” aside, any woman you decide to hitch yourself to in the future - you could grow old together, if you wanted?’

‘But I won’t want to.’

‘Not even Lauren Guthrie?’ Nell couldn’t help herself, or the sneering note in her voice.

‘Lauren?’ Silas crumpled his brow. ‘What about her?’

‘Well, she’s clearly your next “mission”. We’ll get divorced, and then you’ll be free to do whatever you like with her.
Save
her, in whatever way she needs saving. Although, in my view, she’s never been the sort who needed someone to rescue her.’

Silas regarded Nell as if she had told him the earth was flat with frills around the
edges.

‘I know it’s got nothing to do with me,’ Nell rambled on, growing careless, ‘I’ve got no claim on you. But you could have shown a bit more tact and diplomacy. Picking someone who made my life a misery while I was growing up, or at least for a few years in high school. That’s rubbing it in my face a bit too much. And she’s just so . . .
gorgeous
. So obviously every mans’ fantasy. That doesn’t do an awful lot for my self-esteem. Then again -’

‘Nell,’ snapped Silas, ‘be quiet.’

She frowned up at him, affronted.

‘Joshua,’ he muttered under his breath, and jerked his head towards the door.

Nell turned, and saw their son framed in the doorway. He was looking at them both with curiosity, as if he had been watching and listening for a while.

‘Er, Josh,
sweetheart, I didn’t see you there . . . Have you spoken to Nana Gwen? Does she want your dad to pop upstairs . . . ?’

‘Yes.’ The boy nodded. ‘She wants him to open the box.’

‘Box?’ Nell looked from Silas to Joshua, and back again. ‘What box?’

‘I think it might be time,’ said Silas.

‘Time?’ echoed Nell. ‘Box? Would one of you please tell me what you’re talking about?’

Silas turned to her
and pressed a finger to her lips. ‘Nell, you need to be quiet now. You have to listen. You can speak again afterwards, although you’ll need to start making some sense if you expect me to answer.’

And then he took her hand, so firmly, she knew he had no intention of letting go, whether she resisted or not.

However peeved and flushed she felt, Nell had no choice but to follow.

Silas stared at the photographs and other paraphernalia, spread over the bed. His reaction to them had surprised him. The waves of emotion, one after the other, had been hard to disguise. In the warm coral glow of the bedside lamp in Gwendolyn’s room, he had sifted through the relics of his past and relived everything as if the events had only happened a day or so ago.

‘I knew the chest contained riches,’ said Joshua, scooping up one photograph after another. ‘But I knew it wouldn’t be gold or rubies or pearls. It wasn’t
that
sort of treasure.’

Gwendolyn sat propped against a stack of pillows, pale and clearly exhausted, yet fascinated by everything contained in the box she had so dutifully looked after. With a gasp, her hand stretched out shakily and landed on a small peg doll Joshua had just uncovered.

‘This was mine!’ she said hoarsely. ‘I gave it to you, Silas, as a thank you present . . . Do you remember? I made it for you . . .’

‘Of course I remember, Gwendolyn.’ He laid his hand over hers, then picked up a brown and cream photograph lying close by. ‘And this is you, with your mother . . .’

‘Let me see!’ The old woman reached up eagerly. Tears formed in her eyes and rolled down her ashen cheeks. She looked up again, over Silas’s shoulder, to where Nell stood close to the door. ‘Nellie, look . . . This is your great-grandmother and I, when we first settled in Harreloe . . . We were so happy, so
grateful
to have got away . . .’

‘Got away?’ echoed Joshua.

‘My father,’ said Gwendolyn slowly, selectively, ‘wasn’t a nice man, Joshua. He drank every night. And every day, given the chance. Whisky or beer or whatever alcohol he could find at the time. He was cruel to my mother. He always seemed to be shouting. He never had a kind word for me. We lived in Cardiff back then. My mother wanted to get away, but we couldn’t afford to. We had no family to go to. No friends.’

‘Nana,’ murmured Nell, still standing at a distance, ‘why didn’t you ever tell me . . . ?’

The old lady shrugged. ‘Some things were best left unsaid. I told you everything about my life after I was “reborn”; when I first realised how it felt to be truly happy. You see, Nellie, my life would have been very different, but for the selflessness of a complete stranger.’ She glanced at Silas, with a private smile, then looked up at Joshua. Silas knew she was editing the truth for the boy’s sake. Keeping the more disturbing details out of it. She was right to do so, at this stage. ‘Silas brought us here, to Harreloe,’ she went on. ‘He helped us to start over again. A new life. My mother found work as a seamstress. We had our little flat over the tea room, where Calista’s is now.’

‘What about your father?’ said Nell quietly, sombrely. ‘Didn’t he ever try to track you down?’

Gwendolyn gazed at the monochrome photograph of the girl with the fat pigtails and the attractive, but weary-eyed woman clutching her hand. ‘His liver failed, not long after we left . . . In time, my mother remarried. A kind, generous man. We were all happy. Life was good. The war came along and I met your grandfather. As for the rest, I think you know it well enough.’

There were certain
children Silas had rescued who he had always kept a lookout for, watching over them as they grew up, ensuring an easier path into adulthood. Why he had chosen those few, Silas had never attempted to analyse. They had become friends, if that was the correct term. It was the term they themselves seemed to want to use. Those like Abe, who had grown up and old before his eyes. And Gwendolyn, the frightened little girl who had called Silas her guardian angel from the start. It had made her content to think of him that way, and Silas did not care how he was classified.

People took comfort from presuming he was many things, and that was fine. Expected. It was their right to label him, even if that seemed an inherent flaw in their nature.

Silas had reunited mothers with their children, and witnessed the ties that linked them with his own eyes. In this very room was another young mother, also bound to her child. Yet Silas had come to Harreloe to do the opposite of what he had always done, as if he had never understood quite how strong those ties were. There was a growing heaviness within him at the prospect. A pain he could no longer ignore.

‘This is the Gingerbread House!’ exclaimed Joshua, pouncing on another photograph. This time, a faded Polaroid.

‘That’s what your mother calls it, yes.’ Silas looked over the boy’s shoulder, sensing Nell draw closer, too.

‘That’s Old
Sall in front of the cottage,’ she said, with a puzzled expression. ‘But . . . ?’

‘Her real name was
Agnes Scott. She used a pseudonym for her writing.’

‘So Daniel was right.’ Nell’s voice was soft yet quizzical. ‘She
was
a novelist. But how . . . ?’ She looked at Silas, as comprehension seemed to strike. ‘That’s the other grave you lay flowers on . . . isn’t it?
Her
grave.’

‘She needed help once, too,’ Silas admitted, with a nod. ‘She was widowed, about to be evicted from her home. S
he had no job and no money, except for the little she’d saved up during her marriage. I was a friend to her when she was in need of one. I encouraged her to write. She had the talent, and she’d dreamed about it all her life, she confided. I sent her to Harreloe, and explained about the empty Gamekeeper’s Lodge. I knew no one had lived in it for a long time. It needed work doing to it, but she didn’t care. It meant she could afford to rent it. She took in typing for other people for a while, until her writing started to sell. She was only moderately successful, but prolific enough to make an income from it.’

‘I hardly knew her at all,’ said Nell. ‘No one did. She was the village recluse long before Calista. Emma and I used to call her Old
Sall. We thought she was a witch . . .’ Nell shrugged, as if apologising for it. ‘We were just kids.’ Silas watched as she folded her arms over her chest and retreated a few paces from the bed again. ‘Will you excuse me?’ she said, her eyes glittery. ‘I really need to get on with clearing the kitchen.’

Joshua jerked his head up. ‘But, Mum, this is so exciting! It means everything Nana Gwen ever said about my dad is true. And look at all the stuff he’s done, all the places he’s been . . . It’s like . . . like
magic
.’

‘It must be, of a sort,’ said Nell, with gravity, as she spoke directly to the boy. ‘And you need to promise not to tell anyone outside of this room . . . Not yet.’

The boy looked at her solemnly. ‘If you ask me to keep a secret, then I will. If you don’t ask me, how do I know if something is meant to be a secret or not?’

Nell seemed disconcerted. She nodded. ‘You’re right, Joshua. So I’m asking you now. Don’t tell anyone about any of this. There are people out there who wouldn’t understand.’

‘Nell’ - Silas hesitated - ‘please stay. There’s more I’d like to explain. About all this, the things I’ve done . . .’ He gestured to the contents of the box, emptied out over the bed.

‘I know,’ she muttered, ‘but I can’t deal with it right now. I’m sorry, Silas. It’s too much all at once, seeing you like that . . .’ She stepped forward, selecting a picture at random without touching it, merely pointing, as if it might burn her fingers. ‘Like this . . . you’re in uniform . . .’

‘1916. There were so many back then, needing help.’ Abstractedly, Silas smoothed out a crease in the bedspread. ‘I did nothing really, compared to the sacrifice of others. Those that gave their lives. Those that risked everything.’

‘Don’t belittle yourself.’ Nell’s voice was muffled by emotion. ‘You’ve seen so much. Shouldered so much responsibility. I can’t ever begin to imagine it.’

‘I’m not asking you to.’ He stretched out a hand, but she backed away, closer to the door.

‘Please,’ she said, ‘I just need to be alone for a while. I know it’s selfish compared to all this, but . . .’

‘It’s all right.’ Silas bowed his head, excusing her. ‘You go. It’s fine.’

He watched as she fled. It was the best way to describe her awkward, clumsy exit.

Gwendolyn began to tut. ‘You let her run away too easily, Silas. She’s not made of glass. She won’t crack if you hold on to her too hard.’

Silas regarded the old woman. ‘I don’t understand.’

She shrugged. ‘The divorce - how is it going?’

‘How - ?’ Silas frowned, and glanced at Joshua. ‘I’m - I’m not sure. I’m told these things are slow. Nell’s engaged a solicitor, apparently.’

‘But you haven’t found a solicitor yourself yet? Have you signed anything?’

‘Am I meant to have done? Gwendolyn, this is all new to me, I’ve never had to end a marriage this way before.’

‘You don’t have to end it at all, effectively. Unless you’re in a hurry to move on.’

Silas’s frown deepened. ‘It’s Nell who’s in a hurry. She wants to be free to pursue her relationship with Daniel Guthrie.’

Joshua looked up. ‘I like Dan,’ he said benignly. ‘But I wish . . .’

‘What?’ prompted
Silas.

The boy blinked at him for a few seconds. ‘Nothing.’ He shrugged. ‘I guess Freya
was right.’

‘Right about what?’

‘About you and Mum. You’ve got “irreconcilable differences”. That means you don’t get along. It’s why people get divorced. She looked it up on the internet.’

‘I think you and your sister shouldn’t be worrying about the divorce, or why your mother and I are getting one.’

‘It’s easy to
say
that.’ Joshua turned his attention to the photographs again.

‘If Nellie really was in a hurry,’ Gwendolyn piped up, ‘then I’m sure she’d be nagging you more about it. I’m no expert myself, but I’m certain you can speed these things along a bit. If that’s what you both really want.’

‘Of course it’s what we want,’ said Silas. ‘Daniel’s a good man. He needs to get on with his life after Lauren. It’s not healthy for him to dwell on why that failed. He could make Nell happy. They’re well suited.’

‘Marriage isn’t a formula. And you made my Nellie happy once.’

Silas even surprised himself by the sharpness of his reaction. He stood up and raked his hands through his hair. ‘I can’t make anyone happy. Not like that. And especially not Nell. She’s too . . .’

‘Too what?’ Gwendolyn stared at him enquiringly.

‘Too good for me,’ said Silas.

Joshua looked up again. Amazement flickered across his face. ‘You’ve done all these things’ - he waved his hand over the life-story laid out on the bed - ‘and Mum’s too good for you? She’s hardly done anything compared to you.’

Even though the boy was speaking factually, and meant no disrespect, Silas still leaned over him and pressed his hands down on his shoulders.

‘Your mother has done something I’ve never had to do, Joshua. She’s healed the life I damaged. She’s rebuilt it. And she did that for you and your sister, not just for herself. Never forget that. Whatever you do, wherever you go . . . However long you live.’

The boy blinked up at him. ‘OK . . . I’ll remember.’

‘I never knew my own mother,’ said Silas. ‘You’ve had nine years of knowing yours. For that reason alone, you’ll be a greater man than I ever was.’ He let go of his son, who stared up at him with the same eyes Silas saw in his own reflection every day.

‘Silas,’ said Gwendolyn, ‘where are you going?’

He realised he was retreating towards the door. ‘Back to the cottage. It’s getting late.’

‘Are you mad?’ The old woman shifted in bed, straightening up against her pillows and wincing with the pain. ‘Have you seen what it’s like out there?’ She gestured to the narrow gap in her curtains. ‘I’ve never seen a blizzard like it.’

Silas went to the window and peered out. Clusters of snowflakes as large as acorns swirled and dived and dipped against the backdrop of the night sky. Thousands upon thousands of them.

‘I’ll be all right,’ he said unconvincingly. ‘I always am.’

‘But
why put yourself at risk, when there’s no need?’ said Gwendolyn. ‘I don’t know how it works, how you can stay safe in the middle of a war, but I suppose that’s necessary. Traipsing around out there on a night like this isn’t. Not when there’s a perfectly good room going spare.’

‘You mean Grandpa’s, don’t you?’ said Joshua. ‘I know you don’t mean Freya’s, because her bed’s pink.’

‘I can’t,’ said Silas. ‘Nell wouldn’t like it.’

‘Nellie doesn’t want to see you turn into a block of ice, either.’ Gwendolyn gestured towards the door. ‘Now, you go and tell her what I said. She’ll need to freshen it up a little, but it’ll be a lot warmer than that cottage.’

‘Nana Gwen, can I stay up here with you a bit longer, and keep looking through these?’ Joshua indicated the photographs. He glanced at Silas. ‘Is that all right, Dad?’

Silas nodded. ‘For a while. Not too late, though.’ That was the sort of thing a father would say, after all.

To make himself useful, Silas removed the old lady’s empty teacup and saucer from her bedside table. He went down the first flight of stairs. Nell’s bedroom door was wide open. It was obviously her room; he had noticed it on his last visit here. The feminine duvet cover on the large bed, the diaphanous scarves draped around the mirror and the distressed wooden hearts scattered in a random fashion across one wall. A photograph stood on her bedside table. Silas put down the teacup and saucer, and picked up the small wooden frame. The photograph was of his wife in the maternity ward, a twin in each arm. He had probably taken it, although he couldn’t remember.