Winterwood (29 page)

“It was good of you to dance with Simon.”

“I enjoyed it. I think he did, too.”

“Naturally. You have a way with children.”

“He’s scarcely a child.”

“No. Fortunately. I shall have no qualms about leaving him and Edward in the new year.”

“While you travel with Flora?”

He nodded.

Wasn’t he at all interested in what might become of her? Could he cast all thought of her out of his mind so easily?

“Then you still intend to do this? What about your wife?”

“I will arrange a companion for her. She has no desire to travel.”

So he did suspect Charlotte of something devious. At least he was keeping to his intention to separate her from Flora.

“It will be difficult traveling with Flora still so helpless.”

“We won’t go far in the initial stages. Perhaps Switzerland for the winter. I shall find a good reliable nurse for her. Don’t think I am dissatisfied with you. Far from it. If you were twenty years older and a married woman you would be ideal. As it is—”

“I would go with you no matter what anyone said,” Lavinia said in a low, intense voice. “Please let me.”

“Impossible.”

“Oh, I believe it was you and not your grandfather who built that Temple of Virtue!” It was almost as if Mr. Bush, at the piano, read her thoughts, for he raised the tempo of his playing and under cover of the noise she was able to say, “You said you loved me. Have you forgotten?”

It was crazy for her to lose control of herself like this with everyone about them. How could she have done it? She had certainly earned his cool rebuke.

“I think you have had troubles enough in your life, Miss Hurst, without my adding to them. I should never have spoken. I think we both escaped from reality for a moment, but that won’t happen again. I ask you to forgive me.”

She was staring at him wide-eyed—what did he know about her troubles?—when Edward came up to demand that Papa come and look at his new train. Anyway, the music had stopped, and Flora was saying in her clear high voice that it was so sad Great-aunt Tameson had died, she would have enjoyed this party.

Her words seemed to break a spell, or cast a spell, for it was that moment which Mary uncannily chose to rush headlong into the long gallery, her cap ribbons flying, and to burst out breathlessly that the bell in Lady Tameson’s room had been ringing.

“Twice!” she declared. “Sharp, like my lady used to ring it. Phoebe was too scared to answer it, and so was I, begging your pardon,” Mary finished incoherently, and burst into tears. “It were a ghost,” she whispered.

T
HERE WAS NO TIME
to observe who was in the room, or who might have slipped in unobtrusively after Mary’s sensational announcement. First, everyone’s attention was taken by Charlotte, who gave a cry and looked about to have one of her collapses. Daniel’s hand had been on Lavinia’s arm, and now it tightened hard. She saw Jonathon standing near the doorway, his bland, amused look unchanged, and heard Sir Timothy exclaim, “Good God!” and saw him fumble for his spectacles as if the ghost of Lady Tameson might be present and visible. But a moment later the mysterious ringing of the bell was superseded in importance by another happening.

Flora was standing on her feet!

She stood, a thin wavering figure, her chair pushed away, her face illumined with triumph and fright. Then she was overcome by the enormity of her achievement and collapsed into a little heap. Mr. Bush acted in sheer surprise, lifting her into his arms and saying in panic that he thought she had fainted.

Daniel was there immediately to take her in his arms. He laid her on the couch by the fire and hung over her, saying with deep emotion, “It’s happened! At last! A miracle.”

Almost at once Flora recovered consciousness. Excitement leaped into her face, and she wanted to stand on her feet again at once. Daniel restrained her.

“Not yet, my pet. Rest first.”

“But I can move my legs, Papa. Look!” She flung off the rug and, modesty forgotten, her skirts were pulled up to display her thin legs emerging from her starched white pantaloons. “Look!” she whispered again in sheer disbelief.

To Lavinia almost the best thing was the way tenderness had returned to Daniel’s face. His eyes were very bright. They might have held tears.

“It’s a miracle,” he said again.

“No, it isn’t, Papa. It’s only Great-aunt Tameson telling me to walk,” Flora declared with certainty. “That’s why she rang her bell. She knew it would give me a fright and make me get out of my chair. She always said I could if I tried.”

“But her bell didn’t ring!” Charlotte denied vehemently. “That must have been pure imagination on the part of the servants.”

“But I heard it, ma’am!” Everyone had forgotten Mary, who had been responsible for the alarm. Shaken as she still was, she was not going to have her story dismissed. Indignantly she repeated it. She had heard the bell quite distinctly, and so had Phoebe.

“Bless my soul!” said Sir Timothy. “Then why didn’t you answer it? Aren’t you trained to answer bells?”

“We was too scared, sir. I couldn’t have laid hands on that doorknob for all the tea in China. I came flying down here as fast as I could.”

“And Phoebe?” asked Daniel.

“I don’t know where she went, sir. I didn’t wait to see. For Mrs. O’Shaughnessy, most likely.”

“So that whoever was in the room could come out unnoticed.”

“You mean—someone playing a prank!” said Charlotte, her relief so obvious that it seemed she, too, for a moment must have believed in Lady Tameson’s ghost.

“Master Edward!” said Mr. Bush suddenly, his light eyebrows lifted in accusation. He must have been driven to exasperation too often to speak up so plainly in front of his employers. He was probably remembering the tadpole episode.

But Edward heatedly denied his guilt.

“I was here all the time,” he declared aggrievedly. “Wasn’t I, Papa? I was here playing with my train. Why should I go and ring that old bell?”

“Then perhaps it was a burglar who stumbled into the dark,” Simon suggested. “Papa, shouldn’t the house be searched?”

Daniel’s eyes went over the company reflectively. They lingered on Jonathon, who was the kind of person who enjoyed practical jokes. Had he been out of the room and returned unnoticed?

“Can anyone here throw any light on this matter? If they can, it would save a lot of trouble.”

There was silence. Jonathon ground out a cigar in the ashtray beside him. He lifted his eyes slowly and looked toward Charlotte. She was sitting beside Flora holding her hand, seemingly intent now on the miracle that had happened to her daughter.

“Then I agree with Simon,” said Daniel. “The house had better be searched. Look after Flora. Keep her on that couch. Come with me, Simon. And ring for Joseph. What about your jewels, my love?” He looked at Charlotte’s surprisingly unadorned neck. “You’re not wearing your ruby pendant. Have you left it in your room?”

“It’s in the bank, Daniel. Surely you know.”

“I thought you kept it here.”

“I don’t, after that scare we had with Aunt Tameson’s brooch. The one Eliza took. I only have a few not very valuable things in my room.”

“Mamma, please! You’re hurting!”

At Flora’s protest Charlotte released her hand, with an extravagant apology.

“I’m sorry, darling. Did I squeeze too hard? It’s only that I’m so delighted about you. If there is a burglar upstairs, he ought to be thanked. What do a few jewels matter compared to my darling child getting out of that horrid chair!”

“But I’m sure it wasn’t a burglar who rang the bell,” Flora said intensely. “It was Great-aunt Tameson’s hand from the grave!”

Jonathon Peate laughed suddenly, loudly, and strangely enough it seemed to be that sound rather than the ghostly tinkling of the little silver bell beside Lady Tameson’s bed that made Charlotte lose her self-control.

“How
dare
you laugh!” she cried.

“But, my dear sweet Charlotte”—Jonathon flung out his hands innocently—“such an absurdity as that remark of Flora’s could only be treated as a joke. You couldn’t take it seriously?”

The question hung in the air. It seemed that Charlotte had no answer to it. She gazed at him speechlessly, and he seemed to find her hypnotized look even more amusing, for he laughed again, and suggested that perhaps he should go and help Daniel and Simon and the servants search for the ghostly intruder.

The spell was broken by one of the servants coming in to announce that the Christmas carollers had arrived and were in the hall downstairs. Charlotte gladly welcomed the interruption.

“Come, Teddy, Simon, Flora—no, perhaps not you, darling.” She bent swiftly over Flora to kiss her brow. “You’re overexcited and must rest. Poor sweet, your little miracle has been overshadowed by all that silly talk of burglars. But Papa and I are so happy we could cry.” Indeed, Charlotte’s eyes were swimming with tears. “Can you still move your legs?”

“Yes, Mamma. I could walk right across the room if I tried.”

“Well, don’t try. Just lie still. Papa will send for Doctor Munro first thing in the morning. Stay with her, Miss Hurst. You can hear the carollers from here.”

The sweet voices floated up into the long room. The candlelight shining on Flora’s face made it look radiant but ethereal, all its sharp precocity melted into the awareness of her private miracle.

Once in royal David’s city…
sang the carollers, and Lavinia, looking down at Flora, said instinctively, “You look a Christmas angel.”

Flora abruptly dispelled that sentimental illusion by sitting up and beginning to complain that no one was taking any notice of her.

“They say they are, but they don’t. Papa goes off chasing burglars, and Mamma says everyone must listen to those silly carollers. And you, Miss Hurst, you look as if someone had died.”

Lavinia made herself laugh. “Do I? I suppose I’m thinking that you won’t be needing me any longer. You’ll have a proper governess, not a nurse.”

“Miss
Hurst!
I will not! If you say that I’ll refuse to walk.”

“I don’t think so. You’ll find it’s too fascinating, being able to ride again, play games, dance, travel, perhaps. Your Papa may take you back to Venice.”

“Miss Hurst,
why
are you saying all that?”

“I’m just surmising.” Lavinia suddenly knelt down and flung her arms around the slight figure. “Oh, darling! Little love! I’m so happy for you. That’s why I’m crying. As if someone had died, indeed!”

Flora stirred in her arms. Her voice was unsure, afraid. “But Miss Hurst—who did ring Great-aunt Tameson’s bell?”

It looked as if that puzzle were not to be solved. Daniel came back saying that the servants had been aroused and instructed to search the house completely. But what with the invasion of the carollers and all the subsequent noise it would have been easy for an intruder to escape. It was certainly true that the bell had rung, for it was found lying on the floor as if someone had knocked it down in the dark. It was a pity the maids had lost their heads and not waited to see who emerged from the room. It was very likely that someone had been playing a practical joke.

“Let’s bless them for what they did,” Daniel said, looking down at Flora. “If we catch a burglar I’ll willingly let him go scot-free. Indeed, I’ll put a sovereign in his pocket. Now let’s get this child to bed.”

“Oh, Papa! I’m far too happy to go to bed. I’ll never sleep.”

Lavinia doubted if anyone was going to sleep very much for the remainder of the night. But Flora’s exhaustion proved greater than her excitement and soon she was settled and breathing quietly. Lavinia herself stood at the window and looked at the starlight shining over the quiet garden. Flora’s blue garden, with the few gentians flowering in the wintry earth, the forlorn stone face of the infant lifted to the sky, the terrace with the sphinxes, the long shrubbery walk to the Temple of Virtue, concealed among the overgrown rhododendrons and the weeping willow, the lake water shining darkly at the bottom of the slope. The stable clock striking the hour, the white pigeons stirring and giving muffled croons, the roses in the rose garden pruned to a thorny austerity, the great yew shaped like a Chinese pagoda, inky black, the espaliered peach and apricot trees stretching in spider-webbed precision along the rosy brick wall, the far winter-brown fields, and the narrow silver line of sea on the horizon. The strange sadness of it all. For now she was never to see the peach tree burst into blossom, the blue haze of aubrietia and bluebells and forget-me-not come over Flora’s garden, the blaze of rhododendrons in the shrubbery, and the sun shining on the lake.

The Christmas star shone, and the end had come for her.

She lit the candle again, and sat by the dying fire to write in her journal.

“Everyone has gone to bed, but I still sit here in this lovely extravagant gown Flora insisted I wear, looking not at all like a Cinderella with my feet in the ashes, but feeling more like one than I can describe. It is all over. If I have contributed toward Flora’s recovery, then it has been worthwhile, even at the cost of my future happiness. Perhaps this is the way I was to make amends, just as poor Robin is making amends in prison. I don’t doubt that Daniel will recover from whatever damage I have done to his feelings. Men do, I believe. But I? Shall I grow hard-faced from never laughing? Shall I torment the succession of innocent children or old ladies who will be my care for years to come?

“The Christmas star is shining. It means love, and I have to tear love out of my heart.

“Tomorrow Flora will walk again. Doctor Munro, that silly half-blind old man who couldn’t diagnose what was the matter with Willie Jones, will pronounce his verdict. If it is favorable, Flora’s father will prepare to take her on that long holiday abroad. The boys will go to school. Charlotte? What of Charlotte? Is she to be abandoned? Something
has
happened between her and Daniel. Did he, after all, not believe her story of taking the laudanum herself? Is that why he is prepared to take no risks with Flora, who is such a rich little girl? Could he possibly believe… If he did, it is my fault. I sowed the suspicion. I encouraged him to believe that Charlotte, or her sinister cousin perhaps, was avaricious enough to—No, the thought is too terrible to put on paper. But Charlotte is unbalanced. Tonight there was that wildness in her eyes again. She looked so afraid, as if she really believed in ghosts. But ghosts who may have had reason to do her harm. Reason? What am I imagining now? Poor Lady Tameson may have had little affection for her, but why should she want to come back to do her harm?