The Love Child (42 page)

“He will, I know, as soon as his term comes to an end.”

“And now you must stop fretting about this affair. Your father says the man is something of an adventurer and has been involved in one or two scandals.”

“I am sure he is right. Certainly he is not the man for Carlotta.”

“I understand your feelings. It was so wrong of him to persuade her to elope.”

“She is so headstrong. I am afraid for her.”

“Well, you brought her back. She’ll understand that she will have to wait awhile.

Waiting is often so good in this sort of case. When you are young, ardour fades quickly.”

I thought, We must keep them separated. If they don’t meet she will forget him. Benjie is there. It is a great revelation for them to know that they are not brother and sister.

I liked to go out alone. I found it hard to endure light conversation when my mind was full of one thing. I hardly listened when people talked and Harriet complained that I was getting absentminded.

I would ride down to the sea or through the woods, trying all the time to assure myself that she would forget, that it was a momentary infatuation.

A few mornings later I found myself close to Enderby Hall, which had been empty since the death of Robert Frinton. It was Carlotta’s now. It had been shut up since Robert’s funeral and there was talk of selling it.

I had never liked the house. There was an atmosphere of gloom about it. Yet in a way I was drawn to it.

It was foolish to say that it was an unlucky house. Houses could surely not be unlucky; and yet there had been death and tragedy there. And Robert had not lived long to enjoy the place.

Some impulse made me ride up the short drive. I noticed that the 268

bushes were already beginning to be overgrown. I would get Jasper to go over one day and clean up the gardens.

I pulled up and looked at the house, and as I stood there I saw a movement at one of the windows. I saw a hand on the curtain as it moved. There was someone there, looking out.

My first impulse was to turn and gallop away. But I did not. I just stood watching.

The curtain had fallen back into place.

Someone was in the house.

I did not believe in ghosts, and somehow since I had been so unhappy I was less careful of myself. A thought occurred to me that it might be some desperate man hiding there, some fugitive from justice.

The wise thing would be to ride back to Eversleigh and bring someone with me to go over the house.

I did not do this. Instead I dismounted, tethered my horse and went towards the house.

I pushed open the door, which was strange, for it should have been locked. I walked into the hall. There was the staircase over which a poor, demented woman had attempted to hang herself. The gloom, the horror of that house seemed to close about me like a fog.

Go away. Go away, urged my good sense.

But as I stood there I heard movement from above … footsteps, a rustle, the quiet opening of a door.

My heartbeats were thundering. I was trembling a little. I did not know what I expected to see. I was just standing inside the hall, prepared to run if need be. ? A figure had appeared at the head of the stairs.

It was Beaumont Granville.

“You!” I cried.

“Well met,” he said. “I guessed you would pay me a visit. I saw you from the window.”

“So… it is you then.”

“Yes. I have a habit of turning up in your life, haven’t I?”

“I wish to God you would get out of my life.”

“That wouldn’t be very easy for God to arrange as I am going to marry your daughter.”

“That shall never be. My father made that clear.”

“You did not think I would give up as easily as that, did you?”

“You must go away from here.”

“I will for a while … with Carlotta. I thought we might go to Venice. That would be rather piquant, don’t you think?”

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“You remember the scars you received in Venice. You should take care that there are not others.”

“I would have the law on any who attacked me for marrying my wife.”

“She will never be that.”

“You are wrong there, Prim Priscilla. The little girl is on fire for me. You should know I have a special way with women. I am irresistible. You couldn’t resist me, could you? You had better take care. I have a fondness for you because it was such a pleasant night we had together, but I could be angry with you. Now keep out of my affairs. Carlotta and I are going to marry. There is nothing you can do to stop that.”

“What are you doing here … in this house?”

“Staying here for a while until we leave. We shall be going soon and then there will be that belated ceremony.”

“She knows you are here … in this house?”

“Yes, in her house. It will be our house soon.”

“As you hope her fortune will be.”

“It is customary for a man to take charge of his wife’s affairs, you know.”

“Please, please go away. She is young and you are old … old.”

“Experienced,” he corrected. “That is what she likes. She wants no green boys, that one.”

“Have you no shame?”

“No,” he answered, “none.”

“What are you proposing to do?”

“Ha! You come here trying to probe our secrets. I am mad with love for Carlotta.”

“And her fortune.”

“It is part of her charm. I am mad with love for all that but otherwise perfectly sane.”

I felt limp with helplessness. What could I do? One thing I could not do was bear to stand there any longer and bandy words with him while I looked at his mocking face.

I turned and went out to my horse.

I rode back in a kind of daze. I had to do something. What?

Whichever way I looked I saw only one thing. Nothing could save Carlotta but the death of Beaumont Granville. Whatever else happened he would always be there. He would never give up. And he had bewitched her. He would have to die.

When the idea came to me, oddly enough, I felt better. I went 270

along to the gun room. I used to watch Carl and Benjie at shooting practice and I had now and then joined them.

“Not a bad shot for a girl,” Leigh had once said.

It’s the only way, I told myself. I took a small pistol. It was one I had used before.

It seemed like an old friend.

I took it up to my bedroom and hid it in a drawer.

Could I possibly do this? Could I commit murder? I suppose in certain circumstances anyone could, if it was the only way out of an intolerable situation.

It would be over in a few minutes. I would go into the house. I would call him. He would stand on the stairs. All I had to do was raise the gun and fire straight at him.

It would be the end … and it was the only way if Carlotta was not going to be launched into a life of misery.

I owed this to her. I had not owned her when she was born. I had let another woman take her. I must save her from this sadistic brute, for I could clearly imagine what he would do to her.

What he had done to me had scarred me, I believed forever. I had done that for my father and I would do this for Carlotta. I would choose my moment as he stood there on the stairs mocking me.

I felt better now.

There was the day to be lived through. It seemed so long. In the early afternoon I passed my father on the Starrs. He looked at me intently.

He said: “You don’t look well.”

“I’m surprised that you noticed,” I answered.

“I noticed. You’re fretting about that girl of yours, I suppose?”

I did not answer.

He took me by the arm and drew me into the room which was called his private study because he did his estate work there.

He looked at me quite kindly.

“She’s a girl who can look after herself,” he said. “She has a will of her own. If she wants to marry this man, she will, you know. There’s nothing you can do about it.”

“There is something I can do.”

“What?”

“I can stop the marriage and I will.”

“We can keep them apart for a while but that may not work. She’s a determined young woman.”

“And he is determined to get her fortune.”

“He’s got something of a reputation. But it could work. Sometimes a man gives up his old ways and settles down.”

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I knew he was thinking of himself.

I said: “Not this man.”

“How do you know?”

“I do know something of him.”

“Reputations get exaggerated.”

“You said we had parted them. We haven’t. He’s at Enderby Hall.”

“At Enderby Hall!”

“Yes. I saw him there this morning.”

My father laughed. “Her house, of course. Well, I suppose if she says he can be there he has a right to be. You’ve led a sheltered life. You’ve heard tales of him and you’re upsetting yourself and everyone else because of it. If she’s set her mind on him and he on her … well, let them marry. It’s experience for her. It’ll be a taste of life.”

“You don’t know the sort of man he is.”

“Look, daughter, all men have certain experiences in their youth. You don’t expect them to behave like monks, do you?”

Then suddenly I was shouting at him. “I know this man. Do you remember lying in a filthy prison in Dorchester? Do you remember being taken to a room of your own and the next morning being released?”

He looked at me in surprise. “Of course I remember. It’s something I shall never forget. What has it to do with …”

“Everything!” I cried. “How do you think your freedom was bought?
paid for it …p>

with that man. I … the daughter you have always despised.”

“What are you saying. , . ?”

“I am saying this: I went to plead for you. He was there … a great friend of Jeffreys.

He would release you at a price …” I covered my face with my hands. “You have no conception what it was like. That man … How can I tell you? You see him as a normal, lusty man. I tell you he is capable of the greatest cruelty.”

He had taken my hands from my face. He said: “You … you submitted to that for me? Oh, my God! That was why … I looked for my benefactor and all the time it was my own daughter.”

“Yes,” I said, “the daughter who was of no account … the daughter who was not a son.”

He did not speak. I saw the terrible emotion in his face. It was hatred for that man. It was remorse … yes, remorse for years of neglect.

“Priscilla …” He spoke my name softly.

I did not answer. I felt I had had enough. I was exhausted with 272

emotion and the only thought that sustained me was that of the pistol lying in the drawer in my room.

That was a day of events. During the afternoon Leigh came home.

I was in his arms and he was kissing me, studying me.

“It’s been a long time,” I said.

“I came as soon as I could. I’m giving it all up now. I’ve arranged it. I’m going to be home from henceforth.”

“That’s good, Leigh.”

“But, my dearest, you have grown thin … and so pale. You have been ill.”

“I think I shall be all right…soon.”

My mother was excited. “This is wonderful, Leigh,” she cried. “I have been so longing for you to come. Priscilla talks a great deal about your plans for the Dower House.”

She was running to the kitchens. A special feast must be prepared. She seemed to think that now Leigh was home everything would be all right.

I felt bemused. I kept thinking of the pistol in the drawer in my room. What could I do now? I had betrayed my secret at last. My father knew. I had not seen him since I had burst out of that room. He had gone out and had not returned.

It was clear that Leigh guessed there was something wrong. I was not listening to what he was saying. I could not think of anything but Beaumont Granville. Talking to my father as I had had brought it all back.

The secret was no longer shut away. It was out in the open.

When I was alone with Leigh, when he took me hi his arms, when he was reminding me of how long we had been apart, how he had thought of nothing but me, I was only half listening.

I could not respond. Beaumont Granville had often been between us, but never so much as now.

Leigh said to me: “You must tell me what’s wrong, Priscilla. Tell me. Have you met someone? You love someone else? There is someone, is there not?”

“There is someone, Leigh,” I answered, and I saw the stricken look on his face.

He cried out: “I always knew. Right from the first. He was there between us.”

“Not love, Leigh,” I cried, “but hatred…”

I knew I had to tell him then. Perhaps I should have told him in the beginning. .

. when we were married.

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“I must tell you, Leigh,” I said. “I must tell you everything. Today I have told my father. All these years I have kept it locked away. It seemed less shameful out of sight.”

“Priscilla, my dear, I love you. Whatever it is makes no difference to that. Tell me … and we’ll forget it. It will be gone then … no longer between us.”

So I told him as I had told my father.

I saw his face grow dark with fury.

“That man! That man in Venice!”

“He never forgot … he never forgave. He bears the scars you gave him. Oh, Leigh, if you had known.”

“You were so brave,” he said, “so brave, my darling.”

“I saved my father’s life. They freed him the next day.”

“It was a noble thing to do. You sacrificed yourself for him.”

“It didn’t end on that night. It has been with me ever since. It has been between us. … And now, Carlotta. Oh, Leigh, I feel as if it has been slowly killing me.”

“He’ll not marry Carlotta. We’ll stop that.”

“How? How?”

“We’ll tell her this.”

“I couldn’t bear to. She would never understand.”

He kissed me tenderly.

“My darling,” he said, “you are overwrought. This has been a terrible ordeal.”

“How can we stop it? He is here now … here at Enderby … her house. Oh, don’t you see? He will induce her to run away with him. Once they are married …”

“It shall not be. I am looking after you now … just the two of us are together as we were meant to be right from the beginning. You won’t bear this alone anymore.”

“I’m glad you know. It has been a terrible burden. It has been there all the tune.