Past Caring (44 page)

“There must be some mistake.” It was a hope more than an assertion.

“There must indeed be—somewhere. That’s what I’m trying to find out. Would you like to look at the Memoir?” Without waiting for an answer, I fetched it from the bag and handed it to her.

It seemed more fitting for her to receive it than anyone. It was, after all, written for her. Elizabeth held it as she might an original painting by a famous artist, not previously known to exist: cautiously, with nervous apprehension.

“Martin, my dear, you must understand how . . . unexpected this is.”

“I do understand that. It was uncovered by the present owner of Strafford’s property on Madeira. He’s hired me to research its background.”

“Which has turned out to be close to home?”

“Too close for comfort, to judge by your son’s reaction to my visit.”

Elizabeth smiled wanly. “Dear Henry would only have been trying to protect me. My engagement to Edwin is a painful memory. But not so painful now as it once was. If my dear husband were alive, he would probably throw this onto the fire. But I, alas, was always too curious for my own good.”

“Your late husband features in the document.”

“I see.” She nodded her head slowly. “It is then, as you say, thorough.”

“Yes.”

“Having read it, how much do you know?”

“As much as Strafford ever knew. But why not read it yourself ?”

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“Yes”—a firm set of her jaw—“I think that would be best.”

She opened it carefully. “I see that it may take some time. Can you leave it here?”

“I don’t think you’ll want to put it down once you’ve started.”

“Don’t worry, Martin.” She smiled, with a defiant hint of mischief. “It’ll be quite safe with me. I am not my late husband—or my son.” I believed her. “But old ladies lack stamina. Suppose you were to return later. We could discuss it then.”

I had no choice. “Okay. About seven o’clock, perhaps?”

“That would seem admirable.”

“I’ll leave you then.” I rose to go.

“Would you mind showing yourself out, my dear? Dora becomes tetchy if called upon too often.” I assured her I didn’t and made for the door. “Oh, Martin,” she called from her chair,

“thank you for bringing this to me.” Elizabeth was the first to have thanked me for delivering the Memoir. I was flattered by her courtesy. “And, could you fetch my reading glasses from the table before you go?” As I did so, the cat glanced up at me superciliously from the seat it had reclaimed. “It is unquestionably Edwin’s hand,” proclaimed Elizabeth, once she’d propped the tiny gold-rimmed spectacles on her nose. “So strange to see it again after all these years.”

I wondered if she’d kept any of Strafford’s letters but didn’t ask. “I’ll leave you to it.”

“Thank you, my dear.”

As I walked away up the drive, I felt vaguely cheated. Elizabeth was old, charming and accessible. Her house was no fortress.

There was in her no hint of bitterness at Strafford for hurting her or at me for reminding her of it. It had all been absurdly easy. I’d come and gone like a tradesman from the village making a delivery. Only this was one debt she couldn’t settle monthly by cheque.

I’d be back later for payment.

An empty day, waiting on the reading speed and dozing habits of an elderly lady, gave me time to fret. I followed a chalk track up onto the Downs and back again in time for lunch at The Royal Oak. Afterwards, nervously, guiltily, I stole down the foot-

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path by the brook to the wood where I’d spied on Henry.

Quarterleigh, with Dora gone home, had a look of dormant normality. I’d half expected to see Henry’s car in the garage, but there was no sign of it. I’d known there wouldn’t be, had only gone there to quell an irrational fear.

That done, there was nothing to do but lie on the bed in my room at the inn and wait for evening.

A dove from the churchyard was cooing somewhere in the garden of Quarterleigh. Dora was back for another round of duty, depositing empty milk bottles on the doorstep as I walked down the drive.

“Missus said I were to expect you,” she said neutrally. “You’ll find ’er in the conservatory.”

She showed me through. The conservatory was at the back of the house, looking down the sloping lawn to the brook, where small clouds of midges floated among the reeds. The room preserved an afternoon warmth, with rugs spread on a stone floor and potted plants exuding a musty aroma. Elizabeth was seated on cushions in a wicker reclining chair, with the cat on her lap and the Memoir, in its file, on a footstool by her side.

“Good evening, Martin,” she said.

“Good evening.” I looked out of the window. “Your daffodils are going over.”

“All things do, my dear. Please sit down.”

I moved a copy of
Sussex Life
from a canvas-backed chair and sat next to her, our seats arranged so that we saw more of the garden than each other.

“You have a lovely home,” I remarked.

“I feel at peace here, which is all I now seek. Alas, it is clear that Edwin never found that precious commodity.”

“You finished the Memoir then?”

“Yes, indeed. I’m seeing double and feeling heavy in the head, but I’ve read what Edwin had to say and I’m glad to have done so.”

“And what do you make of it?”

“Ah, that’s more difficult than reading. It is—what else could it be?—disturbing. Edwin’s Memoir reads in every sentence like God’s own truth. Only, I know it can’t be. It’s rather shocking to 266

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have it all told, so detailed, so personal, to have it read by a young man like you, to know that you know how I felt to love a man and be betrayed by him.”

“I do see that.”

“I wonder if you do. You said earlier that you know why I broke my engagement with Edwin. How did you find out?”

“A . . . colleague . . . found Strafford’s marriage certificate in the memorabilia Julia Lambourne—Mrs. Kendrick—bequeathed to Birkbeck College, London.”

“Ah, so that’s where it went. I’ve sometimes wondered.”

“Could you tell me more about it?”

“I don’t really think I could. You see, Martin, I need a little time to adjust to this.”

“I understand. It’s just that . . .”

“You’re eager for answers. I understand too. Do you have the certificate?”

“Not here. But I’ve seen it. It’s quite conclusive. Strafford married a Miss van der Merwe in South Africa in 1900.”

Elizabeth frowned slightly. “Quite so. But you wouldn’t think it, would you, to read this?” She inclined her head at the Memoir.

“No. That’s just the point.”

“Martin, my dear, I have a suggestion. Would you care to stay here for a few days? I’m sure it’s very pleasant at The Royal Oak, but here you could be certain the Memoir was safe”—she smiled—“and I could try to answer some of your questions, in an old lady’s good time.”

“That’s kind of you. I’d be delighted to.” I was impatient to hear what she thought, but didn’t want to jeopardize anything by pressurizing her.

“I’ll ask Dora to make up a bed in the guest room while you collect your luggage.”

“I’d better go straightaway.”

“Before you do, I have a question. Who is this man who has hired you? What is his interest?”

“Leo Sellick? He’s a hotelier on Madeira who bought Strafford’s house when it came onto the market. When he found the Memoir, it fascinated him and he’s employed me to satisfy his curiosity. I haven’t told him about Strafford’s secret marriage yet.”

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“I see. So many people curious about my past.”

“It’s inevitable.”

“Not but for this.” She was right, but the Memoir couldn’t be disregarded, any more than Strafford’s marriage could be, except by him. Not that I had the impression Elizabeth wanted to disregard it. I think I’d brought it to her at the right stage of her life, when there was nothing left to lose—for her, anyway.

When I got back from The Royal Oak, Elizabeth had already gone to bed. Dora showed me to my room, then left. I settled in, feeling strangely at ease. There was a vast, feather-mattressed double bed, a broad, solid wardrobe, an empty wash-handstand behind the door, a sash window at floor level looking down into the garden.

As Elizabeth had said she did, I felt at peace in Quarterleigh, It was that sort of place, cosy, rural, womb-like. Even the creaks were comforting. I slept better than I had for days.

“Good morning, Martin.” Elizabeth greeted me with her button-bright smile over the breakfast table. “It’s a lovely day.” Undeniably: the sun was already warm through the last of the moisture on the window. “Can you drive?”

“Well . . . yes.”

“My doctor—a dear, but a terrible fusspot—has instructed me not to. So my car has few outings. I wondered if you would care to take us up onto the Downs.”

“Ah . . . yes. Certainly.”

“Splendid. I feel in need of fresh air. We can talk up there to our hearts’ content.”

Dora seemed amazed to learn that we were going for a drive.

The set of her jaw suggested she didn’t like some of the changes to routine stemming from my arrival.

Elizabeth appeared in a dark blue dress under a white raincoat, carrying a walking stick and sniffing the sweet air from beneath the brim of a pale straw hat. For all her frailty, she looked like a lady with a mission.

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At Elizabeth’s instruction, I drove north-west to Harting Hill, one of the more precipitous parts of the South Downs escarpment. We parked at the top and walked slowly east along the spinal track linking the tops of the downs. It was a fine, breezy morning, with the sheep-cropped turf firm beneath our feet, sky-larks’ song and the bleat of lambs blown to us on the wind. Yew-clumped slopes fell away below to the flat plain of the Rother valley. We had the chalky path to ourselves, to walk and talk.

“When Julia first told me Edwin was married,” said Elizabeth slowly, treading steadily in time to her breath, “I refused to believe her. She was waiting for me in Putney with my aunt when I returned from Edwin’s house, having . . . been there since the previous day.”

“This would have been 23rd June 1910?”

“Is the date so important?”

“It may be.”

“Well, the Memoir would confirm it. At all events, it did not take them long to guess where I had been and, though I had naturally expected them to be shocked, I had not foreseen the horror and outrage with which they reacted. Julia, you see, was something of a free-thinker and my aunt the most indulgent of guardians.

“I sought to set their minds at rest by announcing that Edwin and I were to be married at once. This, however, only increased their consternation. Julia had, you see, already told my aunt what she knew. As I say, I refused to believe it when Julia told me. It went against everything I knew and understood about Edwin. It was simply incredible.”

“What changed your mind?”

“The documentary proof. Julia had not wished to produce it, but felt obliged to do so when she saw that I could not otherwise be convinced. And then it all seemed to make an unpalatable kind of sense.”

“In what way?”

“For nine months, Edwin had found good political reasons why we could not marry. There had been one delay after another, none of his making. Or so it had seemed. But it suddenly occurred to me that it could all have been an elaborate fraud, leading me

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on with a promise he could not keep until . . . until he had achieved his objective.”

“Was there any other proof ?”

“Why, yes. Julia’s brother Archie had met an officer from Edwin’s regiment who recalled that he had married in South Africa. Archie confirmed that to me.”

“Who was this officer?”

“Can’t you guess?”

“Gerald Couchman.”

“That’s right, Martin. I wasn’t introduced to Gerald until later. At first, I thought little of him, but . . .”

“He proved to have winning ways on holiday in Switzerland and Italy.”

Elizabeth stopped in her tracks. “How did you know that?”

“Along with the certificate, the Kendrick Archive also contains a letter from you to Julia reporting Gerald’s arrival in St.

Moritz.”

“I see.” She smiled. “It’s disconcerting to have you know so much about me.”

“Did your husband say much about Strafford?”

“Not really. He knew it was a subject best left alone.”

“Do you think he supplied the certificate?”

“No. I assume Julia obtained it on her own initiative.”

“Would it surprise you to learn that Christabel Pankhurst supplied it to Julia?”

“Not greatly. Christabel would not have approved of Edwin and me. She would have seen it as a form of treachery.”

I told her about the evidence of a plot between Christabel and Lloyd George. I stopped myself suggesting that Couchman might have been involved.

“What you say is quite possible, Martin. Unfortunately, all it proves is that certain people wanted something to use against Edwin and he, in his weakness, gave it to them.”

“Has the Memoir told you much that you didn’t already know?”

“Not a great deal.”

“About your husband, for instance?”

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Beacon Hill. Elizabeth looked at me frankly. “Gerald never made any secret of his failings—at Cambridge, Colenso or elsewhere.

It was his honesty that first drew me to him. We had a long courtship and a long and happy marriage.”

“I’m glad to hear it.” We turned and began to retrace our steps.

“It has to be said, my dear, that there was the great difference between Gerald and Edwin. In a sense, a hasty marriage in South Africa was no worse than a loss of nerve in battle. But Edwin tried to conceal his lapse, whereas Gerald did not. They were rewarded accordingly. Gerald was a dear, good, flawed, loving man: a man I’m proud to have been married to.”