The Woman In The Lake: Can she escape the shadows of the past?
Nicola Cornick
For fans of Kate Morton and Tracy Rees comes a captivating novel about two women, separated by centuries, whose fates are bound together by one haunting secret.***‘A fascinating tale with intriguing twists.’ Barbara Erskine‘I was hooked from the first pages.’ Gill Paul‘You just can’t put it down. Brilliant!’ Katie Fforde***‘I see it all again: the silver moon swimming beneath the water and the golden gown billowing out about her…’1765: Lady Isabella Gerard asks her maid to take her new golden gown and destroy it. Its shimmering beauty has been tainted by the actions of her husband the night before.Three months later: Lord Eustace Gerard stands beside the lake looking down at the woman in the golden gown. As the body slowly rolls over to reveal her face, it’s clear this is not his intended victim…1996: Fenella Brightwell steals a stunning gown from a stately home. Twenty years later and reeling from the end of an abusive marriage, she wonders if it has cursed her all this time. Now she’s determined to discover the history behind the beautiful golden dress…
International bestselling author NICOLA CORNICK became fascinated with history when she was a child, and spent hours poring over historical novels and watching costume dramas. She studied history at university and wrote her master’s thesis on heroes. Nicola also acts as a historical advisor for television and radio. In her spare time she works as a guide in a seventeenth-century mansion.
Copyright (#ulink_fb5f0c4e-6615-5e2b-a907-e6a143b2697f)
An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2019
Copyright © Nicola Cornick 2019
Nicola Cornick asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Ebook Edition © March 2019 ISBN: 9781474064712
For Julia, a Swindon girl
Time flies over us, but leaves its shadow behind.
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE
Contents
Cover (#u38193088-7663-536f-b496-cb1b645ec48e)
About the Author (#ulink_301a9b32-1dec-5231-839e-ee4f664094c6)
Title Page (#uaaeb6578-ae2a-5ec9-9c25-5c1b7a6bbc40)
Copyright (#ulink_de9ee5be-3dab-56d7-a429-767d93602fd0)
Dedication (#ue3de52ec-8a9d-531b-be93-17f2d6333b3a)
Epigraph (#u48c69a71-ab96-5030-aa10-5971851f5268)
Prologue (#ulink_2c0f9dc6-7448-59b4-ac5f-6d52a7b78834)
Chapter 1 (#ulink_62bed444-0c41-5a9e-b4f5-45d2ebc5fd12)
Chapter 2 (#ulink_b75c5433-12f8-5d9f-bb5b-349fdbc4052a)
Chapter 3 (#ulink_56cfc10b-d7c7-5f38-b9f5-6e26c270f720)
Chapter 4 (#ulink_e0146721-e0fc-5dae-9180-bb357c12ce6e)
Chapter 5 (#ulink_074ea30e-c5e6-5c61-97fd-789f6f14a340)
Chapter 6 (#ulink_50d2538b-78db-5a09-875a-50af1049137b)
Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 15 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 16 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 17 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 18 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 19 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 20 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 21 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 22 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 23 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 24 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 25 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 26 (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
Author’s Note (#litres_trial_promo)
Acknowledgements (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
Prologue
Eustace
April 1765
I know what they will say of me when I am dead. I will be cast as a madman and a fool. They will blame the divorce, so scandalous for a peer of the realm, and claim that it drove me to misery and delusion, that it turned my mind. They will rake up all the old gossip and call my wife a whore.
It pleases me that society will slander Isabella over again. I will gladly tolerate being painted a cuckold and a weakling if it hurts her. I wish I could hurt her more but she is beyond my reach now, more is the pity.
There are those who call me a wicked man. They are wrong. True evil requires intent and I never had the will or the cunning to be truly wicked. Only once was I tempted to commit murder and even then it was not my fault, for I swear I was possessed. It was the golden gown that moved me to evil and the gown that led to that most terrible mistake.
I remember the horror of it to this day. I still see the scene so clear before my eyes. She was walking ahead of me, through the dappled moonlight, and I recognised the gown and hastened my step. I swear I had no fixed intention, no thought of murder, not at that moment. I wanted to talk, to reason with her. Then, on the path by the mill, she seemed to stumble and fall and all of a sudden I was seized by the thought that this was my chance to be rid of the threat for ever. I could not bring myself to touch her directly so I nudged her body with my boot and she rolled gently, so gently, over the edge and into the pool.
I see it all again: the silver moon swimming beneath the water and the golden gown billowing out about her like a shroud slowly unfurling. I needed to claim that gown but my fear made me clumsy and I ripped it from her body when it would not yield to my hands. And then…
I break out into a cold sweat whenever I remember. Everything is so vivid. The sweet scent of lime blossom mingled with the stink of dank weed from the millpond, the endless roar of the water over the sluice like the rush to bedlam.
And then… The body rolled over in the water and I saw her properly for the first time in the moon’s reflected glow. It was not the face of my nemesis. I stood there with the gown dripping in my hands and then I was sick; sick with revulsion, sick with fear, sick with disappointment.
Binks came upon me as I knelt there, retching up my guts.
‘I will attend to this, Lord Gerard,’ he said, as though he were my butler tidying away a glass of spilt wine. ‘You should have left it with me, as we agreed.’
Binks was a damned impertinent fellow but a useful one and I was not going to argue with him. I took my carriage back to Lydiard House and I sat here in my study and drank more than I had ever taken before. I was out cold for three days.
When I came to my senses the first thing I saw was the golden gown draped across the end of my bed like a reproachful ghost. I wanted to be rid of it, to burn it, rip it to shreds or give it to the first beggar woman I saw but at the same time I was too afraid; afraid that somehow, some day, it would return to haunt me. My only safety lay in keeping it close to me. Wherever I went the gown came with me, wrapped up tightly, hidden away to contain its poison, but with me all the same. And that is how it haunted me for ever after. That is how it has possessed me, in mind and body.
I have no notion what happened after I left Binks to do the work that I dared not do. I heard reports of the tragedy of course, for the servants were full of the story and it was in all the local newspapers. It was a famous scandal that respected Swindon banker and businessman Samuel Lawrence had drowned his wife in the millpond and then apparently taken his own life, following her down into those dark waters.
In time I almost came to believe those stories myself.
Except that for as long as the gown is with me, I will remember the truth. I will remember Binks, who disappeared like a will-o’-the-wisp once the deed was done, and I will remember Binks’s men, the Moonrakers, hard men, smugglers, criminals. I have lived in fear of them these past twenty years for I know they hate me for killing one of their own. My life is so much more precious, infinitely more important than theirs, and yet I live in fear of a gang of felons.
From the drawing room window I can see the lake here at Lydiard Park glittering in the morning sun. On the days when I am too drink-sodden and addled to walk, the steward places me here, telling me that it will raise my spirits to see the world outside. Little does he know that nothing could cause me more pain than to look upon the shining water. Or perhaps he does know it, and places me here to torment me. Perhaps he hates me too.
The Moonrakers will come for me soon. This morning I received a token from their leader. It was such a beautiful gift, an inlaid box. I unwrapped it with greedy excitement until I saw the tiepin inside with the design of a hanged man, the word ‘remember’, and the initials C. L. Then I dropped it and it went skittering away across the floor propelled by my revulsion.
She need have no fear. I shall never forget that day. The gown will remind me. It will possess me to my last breath.
The sun swims under the rippling water and the day turns dark. The Moonrakers are ready. Ready to fish for their fortunes again, ready for time to repeat itself, ready for the secrets to be told.
Chapter 1
Fenella
2004
She could never forget the day she stole the gown.
Twenty-three of them visited Lydiard Park that day. It should have been twenty-five but Emily Dunn had chickenpox and Lauren Featherstone’s parents had taken her on holiday to Greece despite the fact that it was still term time, and Mrs Holmes, the headmistress, disapproved. Mr Featherstone paid the fees, though, so Mrs Holmes kept quiet.
There were three teachers as well, not that many to keep them all under control. Two of them looked harassed – Miss Littlejohn always looked harassed, and Mr Cash didn’t really like children much – they all knew it even though he never said so – but Miss French was all relaxed and smiley. Miss French was cool, more like a big sister than a teacher.
‘Just one more room to visit, girls,’ she coaxed, when they all started to drag their heels due to heat and tiredness and endless stately home corridors, ‘and then we can go to the tearoom and the shop.’
Fen didn’t have any money to spend in the shop because her grandmother had forgotten again. She wasn’t sure if anyone remembered to pay her school fees either but until someone said something she was stuck at St Hilda’s and that was fine. She’d been to worse schools, plenty of them, some of them boarding, some not. She made friends quickly and easily because she’d learned how. It was either that or forever be the loner, the outsider, the one who came and went without leaving a trace.
‘Fen,’ Jessie, her best friend, all brown curls and bossiness, was pulling on her sleeve. ‘Come on.’
But Fen lingered in the state bedroom as the gaggle of schoolgirls in their red and white summer dresses and red blazers went chattering through the doorway into the drawing room. As soon as they were gone the silence swept back in like a tide, cutting her off. It was odd, as though a thick door had slammed somewhere separating her from the rest of the world. She could hear her own breathing, feel the sun on her face as it fell through the high windows to speckle the wooden floor.
It wasn’t a room that appealed to her at all. Her bedroom in her grandmother Sarah’s house in West Swindon was quite small, painted pale green and had an accumulation of vintage bits of china and glass and other small pieces that Sarah had encouraged her to buy on their trips to the flea markets and car boot sales. This huge space with its flock wallpaper, soaring white pillars and four poster bed with its embroidered hangings seemed completely lifeless. It was no one’s room, merely a museum. The whole place felt empty to her and a bit creepy; the other rooms held waxwork figures in period dress that had made her shudder. The other girls had giggled over them but Fen had imagined them as zombies or automatons come to life, stalking the corridors of the old house.
There was a door in the corner and beyond it a room that looked to be full of light. It beckoned to her. Fen peeped inside. It was small, oval-shaped, painted in blue and white like the Wedgwood vases that her grandmother collected. What caught her eye, though, was the stained glass window with its tiny little painted panels depicting colourful pictures of fruit, flowers, animals – was that an elephant? – something that looked half-man half-goat, a ship to sail away in, a mermaid… The window enchanted her.
She stretched out a hand towards the light, wanting to touch those bright panes and experience that vivid world but before her fingers touched the glass there was the sound of running footsteps behind her.
‘Fen! Fenella! Where are you?’
It was Jessie’s voice, anxious and breathless now. Fen dropped her hand and turned quickly, hurrying back through the door of the closet into the bedroom beyond. Jessie was not there. Everything looked the same, as empty and lifeless as before. And yet on second glance it did not. It took Fen a moment to realise what was different. The shutters at the windows were now closed and the lamps were lit; they smelled unpleasantly of oil and heat. Perhaps one of the curators had come in whilst she was in the blue closet and had decided to block out the bright sun in case it damaged the furnishings.
That was not the only difference though. The bed was rumpled, covers thrown back, and the wardrobe door was half-open, revealing shelves of clothes within that looked as though they had been tossed aside by an impatient hand. All of a sudden the place looked lived in rather than frozen in time. It was an unsettling feeling; instead of making the house seem more real, it gave Fen the creeps. Looking straight ahead, she was aware that her heart was suddenly beating hard but was not quite sure why. She walked quickly through into the drawing room to find the rest of the pupils.
In the drawing room the differences were even more marked. There was a fire burning fiercely in the grate even though here the shutters were thrown back and the room was in full sunlight. It was so hot and airless that Fen felt the sweat spring on the back of her neck and trickle uncomfortably beneath her collar. The whole house was as quiet as a sepulchre. It was uncanny.
Over the high back of one chair, shimmering in the light with a soft, golden glow, was the most beautiful dress Fen had ever seen. She stared at it. It felt almost impossible to tear her gaze away. She did not even realise that she had started to move towards it; her hand was on the material and it felt as soft as clouds, lighter than air, a trail of silver and gold spangled with stars.
‘Pound? Where the hell are you, man?’
Fen had not seen the figure sitting before the window, almost hidden by the high curved back of a wing chair. She jumped at the crack of his voice and spun around. He was fair, florid, dressed in a wig and poorly fitting jacket with some sort of scarf wound carelessly about his neck and a waistcoat flapping open. He looked bad-tempered and drunk. Fen was only thirteen but she knew an alcoholic when she saw one. She could smell the fumes on him from where she was standing. Nevertheless she opened her mouth to apologise. He was probably a re-enactor of some sort, or a room steward, although really it didn’t seem appropriate to have drunks in costume wandering about the place.
‘I got lost—’ Quick, facile lies came easily to Fen, they were her survival tactics. But the drunk wasn’t looking at her, more over her shoulder towards the doorway.
‘Pound!’ the man roared. ‘Damn you, get in here now and pour me more wine!’
There was a bottle on the table, Fen saw, cruelly placed either by accident or design just out of his reach. He lurched forward and almost fell from the chair, clutching at the sides to steady himself. She saw his face clearly then; the vicious lines drawn deep about the mouth, the pain and frustration and anger in the eyes. Panic seized her. She wondered if she had unwittingly stumbled into some sort of performance put on for the visitors. Yet that didn’t feel right. There was no audience apart from her and the intensity of the man’s fury and desolation seemed all too visceral. She needed to get out of there.
‘Take me…’
The golden gown seemed to call to her. She felt the allure of it and was powerless to resist. The impulse was so strong and so sudden that she reacted instinctively. She grabbed the gown and ran, fumbling to push it into her rucksack, her feet slipping and sliding on the wooden floor. She was panting, her heart thumping, and she stopped only when she burst through the doorway into the hall and saw the startled faces of staff and visitors turned in her direction.
‘Fenella Brightwell?’
A woman with iron-grey hair and an iron demeanour, a museum piece herself, marched up to her.
‘Yes,’ Fen said. Her mind was still grappling with what she had seen; with the violence and the anger. Were they making a film? How embarrassing if she had accidentally wandered onto the set mid-performance. She would never live that down. Everyone would be laughing at her. No doubt the iron woman was about to tell her off.
‘We’ve been looking for you everywhere,’ the woman said. Her grey eyes snapped with irritation. ‘The rest of your group have gone back to the coach. If you run you might catch them.’
‘What? Oh, thank you.’ Fen was still distracted by the scene in the drawing room and the old man. There had been something pathetic about his impotent desperation.
‘Excuse me,’ she said, very politely, ‘but is there some sort of film being made in the drawing room? Only there was an old man sitting in a chair by the window and I thought—’
‘It’s forbidden to sit on the furniture,’ the woman said. ‘How many times do I have to tell people?’ And she stalked off towards the drawing room.
Fen hoisted her rucksack onto her shoulder and went outside. It was a relief to be out in the fresh air. There had been something smothering about the room and its occupant, brim-full of anger and misery.
She started to walk up the wide gravel path through the woods. She had no intention of running all the way back to the car park. The coach wouldn’t go without her. The teachers would get into too much trouble if they did.
She looked back at the house. There were visitors milling around in the drawing room. She could see them through the glass of the sash windows. The chair looking out over the gardens was empty. It was odd that the drunk had disappeared but perhaps the iron-grey woman had thrown him out already. He was probably homeless or care in the community, or something. She had more pressing things to think about anyway, such as the need for a plausible excuse for where she had been so that the teachers didn’t get cross with her.
‘You got locked in the lavatory!’ Miss French said, eyes lighting up with amusement, as Fen clambered aboard the coach and made her apologies. ‘Oh, Fenella! Only you!’
Even harassed Miss Littlejohn relaxed into a smile. Mr Cash didn’t; he looked hot and annoyed and had been searching the gardens for her. He didn’t look as though he believed her either but Fen didn’t care.
‘I looked for you everywhere,’ Jessie whispered, as Fen slid into the seat next to her. ‘How did you get out?’
‘They had to break the door in,’ Fen said. ‘The lock had jammed. They sent for a carpenter.’ She smiled. ‘He was cute.’
‘Fen was rescued by a cute carpenter,’ Jessie said, giggling, to Kesia, who was sitting across the aisle. Word went around the coach. Soon everyone was hanging over the back of the seats or crowding the aisle, wanting to know what her rescuer had looked like.
‘Sit down, girls,’ Mr Cash snapped. ‘You’re a health and safety hazard.’
There was more giggling at that.
The coach dropped Fen off at the end of her grandmother’s road. No one else from school lived in The Planks, although the houses were very nice. Most of the girls lived in the picture postcard villages outside Swindon rather than in the town itself. There was always a slight drawing back, eyebrows raised in surprise, when Fen mentioned that she lived in town so she never told anyone.
When she pushed open the back door she could hear the sound of the television, very loud. It was four thirty. Her grandmother would already be halfway down her second bottle of wine by now, watching the afternoon soaps with her spaniel, Scampi, sleeping next to her. Fen didn’t interrupt her. Her grandmother was a happy drunk but not if someone disturbed her when she was watching TV. Anyway, she had homework to do, an essay on the visit to Lydiard Park, but that could wait. She rummaged in her coat pocket and took out a battered copy of Bliss magazine that she had found under Kesia’s seat in the coach and lay back on her bed with a contented sigh. She thought that Kes had probably dropped the magazine accidentally rather than finished with it but her loss was Fen’s gain. She’d give it back when she had read it since Kes was her friend.
At five o’clock the living room door banged and there were footsteps on the stairs.
‘Fenella!’
Her grandmother never called her Fen. She thought it was common to shorten people’s names.
‘Darling!’ Her grandmother rushed in and wrapped her in a wine and patchouli scented hug. ‘How was the trip? Did you have fun?’
‘It was great, thanks.’ Fen never told her grandmother anything significant. She had learned long ago only to give adults information on a need-to-know basis. Perhaps the lesson had been learned when she had first tried to explain to her mother about her grandmother’s drinking.
‘We all like a glass of sweet sherry now and then, Fenella,’ her mother had said on a crackly telephone line from Patagonia, where she had been leading an archaeological dig. ‘Don’t worry about it. Your gran is fine.’
It was then that Fen had realised she was on her own. Her father had run off with one of his PhD students when she was only seven; they didn’t talk anymore, in fact she had no idea where he was, or even if he was dead or alive. One of her brothers was at boarding school, the other on a gap year in Malawi. Her elder sister, Pepper, was with their mother in Argentina, working as an unpaid assistant on the dig. Fen couldn’t tell either Jessie or Kesia about her gran, even though they were her closest friends at school. They might laugh at her or tell other people. It was too much of a risk.
‘I must show you the bracelet I bought in a charity shop this afternoon,’ Fen’s grandmother was saying. ‘I’m sure they’re real rubies, and nineteenth century too!’
‘Well, you never know,’ Fen said, squeezing her hand. She felt a rush of affection for Sarah. Her grandmother had been there for her when everyone else had buggered off and left her, and that counted for a lot even if it meant that Fen was looking after Sarah most of the time rather than vice versa. Besides, she knew that Sarah was sad. Fen didn’t remember her grandfather, who had died when she was only three, but by all accounts he had been a wonderful man as well as a rich one. Once widowed, Sarah had had plenty of suitors, as she quaintly called the men who were after Granddad’s money, but none of them held a candle to him.
‘What’s for tea?’ her grandmother asked now. With a sigh, Fen put aside the magazine and stood up. She knew she had better find something or it would be a tin of baked beans again.
It was only later that she opened her rucksack. The golden dress from Lydiard Park was bundled up inside. Fen had known it was there, of course, but she had deliberately ignored it because to think about it was too difficult. She didn’t know why she had stolen it. She wished she hadn’t. Sometimes she took small things: sweets from the post office, a pair of tights or some lipstick or face cream. She didn’t do it for the excitement. It was weird really. It scared her but at the same time she needed to do it. The impulse was uncontrollable. She had no idea why. It wasn’t as though she needed to steal. Her grandmother was generous with pocket money when she remembered. It wasn’t even as though Fen wanted the things she took. She usually threw them away.
The golden gown, though… That had felt different. The impulse to take it had been more powerful than anything she had ever previously known. It had been totally instinctive and irresistible, which was very frightening.
She wondered if anyone had noticed that it had disappeared. Surely they must and tomorrow there would be a message waiting for her to go to Mrs Holmes’s office and she would be arrested for theft, and then she would need to make up another story and convince them that she had taken it by accident. She screwed her eyes tight shut. She wasn’t a bad person. She did her best. But sometimes she just could not help herself.
She should give the gown back. She should own up before anyone asked her.
Fen stood irresolute for a moment in the middle of the bedroom floor, clutching the gown to her chest. She did not want to let it go. Already it felt too precious, too secret and too special. It wasn’t the sort of dress she would ever wear but, even so, she knew how important it was. She just knew it.
Her palms itched. Was it guilt? Greed? She was not sure. She only knew that it was essential that she should keep the gown. It was hers now.
She laid it flat on the desk and looked at it in the light from the anglepoise lamp. The material felt as soft as feathers, as light as clouds, just as it had when she had first touched it. It was so fine. She had never seen anything so pretty. The gold glowed richly and in the weave there was a bright silver thread creating elaborate patterns. Lace adorned the neck and dripped from the sleeves.
Then she noticed the tears, two of them, ugly rips in the material, one at the waist, one on the bodice. She felt a sense of fury that anyone would damage the gown. She would have to sew it up and make it whole again. She felt compelled to repair it at once.
The sensation was quite uncomfortable. It was urgent, fierce, as though the dress possessed her as much as she possessed it. She did not like the way it seemed to control her and tell her what to do. It felt as though she should go and find the needlework box and start work on the repairs at once.
Fen didn’t like anyone telling her what to do. She fought hard against the need to do as the dress demanded and folded it up again, very carefully, and placed it in the bottom drawer of the battered chest in the corner of the room. She didn’t like the chest much but Sarah had bought it at an antique fair in Hungerford and had sworn it was Chippendale. There was nowhere in the house for it to go so it had ended up in Fen’s room, the home for homeless objects.
She pushed the drawer closed and the golden radiance of the gown disappeared. Immediately she felt a little easier, safer in some odd way. Out of sight, out of mind. She could forget that she had stolen it now, forget the drunken man and his fury, the over-heated room, the smothering blanket of silence. She wanted to forget and yet at the same time the gown would not allow it…
The phone rang downstairs, snapping the intense quiet and freeing her. Fen waited for Sarah to answer it but there was no sound, no movement above the noise of the television. The bell rang on and on. It would be her mother, Lisa, Fen thought, checking the time. It was early evening in Patagonia. She could tell her all about the visit to Lydiard House and how she had got locked in the lavatory even though she hadn’t. At the end her mother would say ‘only you, Fenella,’ like Miss French had, and laugh, and they would both be happy because everything seemed normal even if it wasn’t really. Her mother never wanted to know if there was anything wrong. She certainly would never want to know that her daughter had stolen a gown from a stately home, a gown that even now Fen itched to take from its hiding place and hug close to her. It felt like a battle of wills, as though she was possessed. Which was weird because at the end of the day it was only a dress.
She went to answer the phone and when she had finished chatting to her mother and had roused Sarah, grumbling, from the ten o’clock news, she went to bed. She half-expected to dream about the gown since it was preying on her mind but in the end she didn’t dream about anything at all and in the morning she got up and went to school and she wasn’t called into Mrs Holmes’s office and no one talked about the visit to Lydiard at all.
On the way home she went into town with Jessie, Kesia, Laura and a few others, and when they weren’t watching, she pocketed a silver necklace from the stand on the counter in the chemist shop. It was only a cheap little thing and when she got back and put it on the desk it looked dull in the light. One of the links was already broken. She knew she wouldn’t wear it so it didn’t matter. That wasn’t why she had taken it. There wasn’t a good reason for her actions. The dress, the necklace… She just had to take things. It made her feel better for about five minutes but then afterwards she felt worse.
‘Fenella!’ Her grandmother was calling her. Fen wondered if they had run out of milk. She hadn’t had chance to do the shopping yet.
‘Jessie’s mother’s here,’ Sarah said when Fen came downstairs. ‘She wonders if you would like to go over for tea?’
‘That would be lovely,’ Fen said. At least that way she would get a meal she hadn’t had to cook herself. Through the window she could see Jessie in the back of the Volvo and Jessie’s older brother – a thin, intense boy with a lock of dark hair falling across his forehead – in the front. He looked impatient.
She grabbed her bag and ignored the coat Sarah was holding out to her. Old people always thought you had to wear a coat or you’d catch a chill but she never felt the cold. For a moment she wondered what sort of state Sarah would be in when she got home but she pushed the thought away. It would good to be part of a proper family even if it was only for one evening. Perhaps Jessie’s mum would make shepherd’s pie and they could all sit around the telly and maybe she might even be asked to stay over.
She sat in the back of the car beside Jessie and looked at the little silver charm in the shape of padlock that was attached to Jessie’s mum’s handbag. It was a pretty little thing and Fen badly wanted to take it, so badly it felt as though her fingers were itching. In the end she never got the chance but when she went to the cloakroom later she found another silver charm just lying on the windowsill, this one shaped like a letter A. She took that instead. She didn’t like taking things from Jessie’s house but the urge was just too strong and in the end there was nothing she could do to resist. By the time Mrs Ross took her home she had also taken a little leather notebook and a nerdy-looking digital watch that probably belonged to Jessie’s brother. She didn’t like the watch; it was ugly, so she threw it in the bin as soon as she got home.
Chapter 2
Isabella
London, Late Spring 1763
‘Dr Baird is here, milady.’
Constance, my maid, held the bedchamber door wide for the physician to come in. Her gaze was averted. I knew she did not care for doctors, viewing them as akin to magicians. She would not meet Dr Baird’s gaze in case he cast a spell on her. Nor could she look at me that morning. She could not bear to see the effects of Eustace’s beatings. I did not mind for I had no desire to see pity in the eyes of a maidservant.
‘Good morning, Lady Gerard.’ Dr Baird, in contrast, had no difficulty in greeting me as though everything was quite normal. Perhaps this was his normality, tending to the battered wives of violent and syphilitic peers across London. I had no notion. It was not a matter I discussed with my acquaintance.
Only once had my cousin Maria confided that her husband had beaten her and then she had looked so mortified to be so indiscreet that she begged me to forget she had spoken.
‘Dr Baird.’ I did not try to smile. It hurt my face too much.
‘I was sorry to hear of your indisposition.’ He was sympathetic but brisk, placing his bag on the upright chair, crossing the room to come to my side. Dr Baird and I shared many secrets but he was not a man with whom I felt comfortable. He was too urbane, too accommodating. Often when he had been to visit me he took a glass of wine with Eustace in the library. Eustace was the one who paid his bills. I often wondered what they talked about, the viscount and the doctor. They were of an age, but their lives were so very different. Dr Baird was from a good family, I seemed to recollect, but they were poor.
He turned my face gently to the light that streamed in through the window so that he could see my injuries more clearly. His hand was warm against my cheek. It was quite pleasant and I forgot for a moment why he was there. Then I saw Constance flinch at the sight of my face and immediately I felt ashamed of how I looked and of people knowing.
‘Another fall?’ Dr Baird asked.
‘As you see.’
This was the fourth time he had been called to see me. On one occasion I had severe bruising to my arms, necessitating the wearing of unseasonably warm clothing all through a very hot June. On another I had been pregnant but thankfully had not lost the child.
‘Do you have any other injuries?’ His tone was bland, revealing no emotion. I studied his face, so close to mine, wanting to see a hint of something. Shock, perhaps. But Dr Baird had, I imagined, seen far worse sights than the one I presented and there was nothing to see there but professional concern.
‘Fortunately not this time,’ I said.
He nodded, opening his bag to take out a jar of ointment.
‘This should help you heal. It will take a few weeks.’
I did not reply. The scent of beeswax reached me, not quite strong enough to conceal the smell of something more rancid beneath. Dr Baird approached me, pot in one hand. As he leaned over me I could smell the scent of his body beneath the elegant clothes. It was not unpleasant but it felt too intimate being so close to him. It seemed my senses were too sharp today, as though my skin was too thin, my body vulnerable to a bombardment of sensation as a result of Eustace’s assault. The call of the birds outside was too loud, as was the rustle of cloth as Constance moved over to the window so that she did not have to watch the doctor ministering to me.
‘Lady Gerard. I feel you should…’ Dr Baird hesitated. In the waiting silence I thought: Do not let him say that I should be more careful, or I may have to break my teapot over his head, thereby requiring the physician to treat himself. But perhaps he would be right. Perhaps I should tread more quietly, turn a softer answer to Eustace’s fury, placate him. Yet if I did he would probably hit all the harder. He was perpetually angry and everything I did only served to feed his fury.
‘You should, perhaps, spend some time in the country.’ Dr Baird was not looking at me but was concentrating on delicately applying the ointment to the bruises and abrasions. I forced myself to keep quite still though it stung horribly. ‘It would be good for you, the fresh air, the change of scene.’ He stopped, his hand upraised for the next dab. It reminded me unpleasantly of Eustace and I recoiled instinctively.
‘Your pardon.’ Dr Baird resumed the dabbing. ‘Your husband…’ He paused again. ‘Is he away?’
‘Lord Gerard left for Paris this morning.’ With his latest mistress. Last night he beat me and forced himself on me, and today he takes his doxy abroad. I wondered about her sometimes; who she was, whether he treated her as he did me. I hoped he did for it would be intolerable to think there were women he cherished.
‘Then this is an ideal time in which to take some rest.’ Dr Baird smiled at me encouragingly. ‘Perhaps a family visit—’
‘No.’ I did not want to go to Moresby Hall, with its huge dark rooms cluttered with the spoils of war. I had hated Moresby as a child and even now as an adult, that dislike persisted. It was a vast, echoing barn of a house that was no home, only a mausoleum to my grandfather, a dead war hero. My brother lived there now but he had changed nothing and the house offered no comfort.
‘Perhaps not.’ Dr Baird had misunderstood me. ‘I appreciate that you might not wish to see anyone at the moment. But some time in the country might be restorative after the bustle of London.’
I glanced towards the window. Constance had pulled back the drapes and was looking out over the gardens now in order to avoid having to look at me. The window was open and a light summer breeze stirred the air. It was very quiet. I could hear no carriage wheels, nor voices; nothing to connect me to the world outside. London was light of company in the summer, of course, when most people were at their estates, and what company there was I could not be seen in, not with a face like this. Dr Baird was correct. The heaviest veil would not conceal Eustace’s handiwork and the most convincing story could not account for it.
I felt so tired all of a sudden. To go anywhere, to do anything, would be the most monstrous effort. Merely to think of it made me want to close my eyes and sleep.
‘Lady Gerard.’ Dr Baird’s voice prompted me. I wished he would cease nagging.
‘I will consider it.’
There was a crease of concern between his eyes. They were hazel in colour with very thick, dark lashes. I had not noticed before but now that I did I realised that he was a good-looking man.
‘I do feel,’ he said slowly, ‘that for the sake of your health you should consider speaking to your brother.’
I knew at once what he meant. When my sister Betty had left her husband it was George who had given her shelter and helped to effect a reconciliation between her and Lord Pembroke. I knew George would be prepared to do the same for me, but my situation was very different. Eustace and Jack Pembroke were both philanderers but Jack had never raised a hand against my sister. If I left Eustace I would not want to go back.
‘I will consider speaking to the Duke,’ I said. Then, with an effort: ‘Thank you for your concern, Dr Baird.’
The frown remained in his eyes. He knew I would not approach George for help.
‘Is there anything else I can assist you with, Lady Gerard?’ His tone was bland again but his gaze dropped lower, making his meaning precise. It was all I could do not to squirm in my chair with the power of suggestion.
‘No thank you,’ I said. ‘I am well at present.’
‘You have no need for a further dose of mercury?’
I repressed a shudder. ‘No, I do not.’ Regrettably, that had been the other occasion on which Dr Baird had had to treat me: when Eustace gave me a dose of the pox passed on from some whore he had bedded.
‘I’m glad to hear it.’ Dr Baird snapped his case shut. It was his custom to leave at that point, and briskly, his task accomplished. This time, though, he lingered.
‘Please consider my advice,’ he said. His tone had changed. He sounded almost diffident. ‘For the sake of your health – for your safety, Lady Gerard, I do counsel you to leave.’
I looked up, startled. This was too close to plain-speaking. If he continued in this vein we could no longer pretend.
‘Dr Baird—’
He swept my words aside, reaching for my hand. ‘I have watched for too long in silence. Now I must speak. If you need assistance, Lady Gerard, if I can help you in any way, you need only ask. It would be an honour. I appreciate that you might not have financial means of your own and so may need money or some other support—’
I heard Constance gasp. So did Dr Baird; he looked over at her quickly, nervously, as though he had forgotten she was in the room. It was too late for concealment now. His words, his touch, had given him away. In my preoccupation I had been very slow to realise how he felt about me. Dr Baird liked to save people. I suppose it was laudable in a man of his profession. Unfortunately he wanted to save me from my husband and that was impossible.
‘You are very kind.’ I moved to extricate him from his mistake, releasing myself gently from his grasp and releasing him from his unspoken pledge. ‘I am grateful to you for your advice and I will consider it.’ Then, as he opened his mouth to speak again: ‘Good day to you, Dr Baird. Pray, send your bill to my husband as usual.’
I saw the withdrawal come into his eyes. He bowed stiffly. ‘Lady Gerard.’ The door closed behind him with a reproachful click. Constance turned towards me.
‘Oh, ma’am!’ she said. ‘That poor man. He is smitten by you.’
‘You have too soft a heart,’ I said. ‘What would you have me do? Accept his attentions?’ I could just imagine my great-grandmother, the Duchess, ‘A physician? My dear, if you must dally, at the very least you should choose a gentleman.’
‘He only wanted to help you.’ Her chin had set obstinately. Constance, so well named, saw the world in very simple terms.
‘There is always a price.’ I picked up my cup. The tea was cold.
‘I’ll call for more.’ With a practical task to perform, Constance was restored to good spirits. I watched her busy about my chambers. I could not have moved if I had tried. My body felt weighted with lead.
She rang the bell, then started folding and tidying away my clothes. Over the back of a chair I saw the golden gown that Eustace had given me the previous night. It was exceedingly pretty, with silver thread woven through the silk, and a soft, shimmering appearance. I had seen it as a peace offering, which had been foolish of me. It was not peace Eustace wanted, except perhaps from the torment of both hating and desiring me.
He had presented the gown to me with a great flourish, just as Constance had been dressing me for dinner. It had been an odd business, for Eustace never normally gave me clothes, having a very masculine inability to judge my size. I could see at once, simply looking at it, that the gown was too large for me. Not only that, but the silk weave was of too thick and heavy a style for the summer.
‘How beautiful it is, my dear,’ I said. ‘But tonight is so very hot, don’t you think? I would rather save such an elegant gown for the winter balls—’
I got no further, for Eustace swept every item from the surface of my dressing table. Powder clouded the air, brushes and combs flew, my pearls clattered to the floor. Constance hurried forward to try to pick them up and he turned on her.
‘Get out, girl!’
She ran.
But not I. Eustace never let me run. He smiled at me, that madman’s smile, and then he struck me. I had learned not to try to defend myself. It only made him more determined. I stood and waited. I absented myself from my body.
‘Ungrateful jade,’ my husband said. My petticoats were flimsy and they ripped all too easily beneath his grasp. One careless swipe of his hand and I fell like a broken marionette.
I watched with detachment as he raped me. It was over very quickly. Small mercies.
Eustace heaved himself up and stood panting over me. I thought he might kick me as I lay there. I wanted to close my eyes against the threat but I did not, and after a moment he walked away, weaving across the room like a drunkard, leaving the door swinging wide so the entire household might see the fate of an unappreciative wife.
‘My lady?’
Constance was watching me. She had seen me staring at the gown, reliving the memory.
‘I’ll take it away, milady.’ She seemed eager. ‘You won’t be wanting to look at it again, I daresay, after what happened.’
I disliked her imagining that she knew how I felt, but for all that, she was right; I did not want to look on it and be reminded of Eustace’s cruelty.
‘By all means,’ I said. Then, reminding her that it was my decision alone: ‘Wrap it up and put it away. I may want to have it altered someday.’
Constance looked taken aback. ‘You wouldn’t wear it, surely? Not now!’
I wondered if she had thought I would give it to her. I had given her small items before: gloves, shawls, articles for which I had no further use, even an old cloak once, and a worn out spencer. It was the prerogative of a lady’s maid, after all, to take her mistress’s cast-offs. A gown was a different matter, however, especially one as costly as this. I had seen the look in her eyes as she had watched me unwrap it. There had been envy there and wistfulness. Well, she would not gain by my injuries.
‘Who knows?’ I said. ‘Perhaps I may, one day.’
‘Very well, milady.’ Her lips pursed and she looked censorious. It amused me, little Constance Lawrence disapproving of me. She waited for me to give her direction on whether I would get dressed, take breakfast in my room or call for paper and ink to write to my brother as Dr Baird had suggested. I could not decide. The shades were down in my mind, shuttering me in, trapping me. I was too tired to move, too tired to think.
‘Cover the mirrors,’ I said abruptly. I did not want to see my reflection and the devastation that Eustace had wrought on me.
She opened a drawer and took out the drapes, moving from one gilt mirror to the next, arranging them over the glass as though the house had suffered a bereavement. I stood up, moving stiffly, and crossed to the chair where the golden gown lay. Like me it looked crumpled and disjointed.
I took it up in my hands. The silk felt very soft. I wanted to hold it close to me.
The strangest thing happened then. It felt as though a spark had been lit deep inside me and started to burn. I clutched the gown tightly and it fostered the light, feeding it, stoking it to a blaze. It gave me strength and cleared my mind. I knew then that there was nothing to be gained from writing to George or seeking reconciliation with Eustace, nothing but further grief and pain.
‘Eustace must die…’
The words rippled through my mind like a gentle wave over sand. My fingers tightened on the golden cloth and the idea took root immovably in my mind. It happened so quickly, so easily. One moment I was standing there broken, at a loss, and the next I was fired with determination.
A widow had by far a better deal than a wife. Therefore Eustace must die. It was as simple as that. I might wait for providence to assist me, I supposed, but that was an uncertain business. It might take years. Eustace might drink himself to death or be trampled by one of his racehorses, but I could not wait. I needed to take action.
I had no idea how my husband’s murder might be achieved but I knew I would think of something.
Chapter 3
Constance
London, Late Spring 1763
I had never liked Lady Gerard. Over time, I grew to hate her.
The hatred began the day she would not give me the golden gown. I had not anticipated that she would wish to keep it, not when it had provoked so vile a scene between her and his lordship. Perhaps that had been naïve of me for she was never generous. While other maids were well rewarded by their grateful mistresses, I received very little but complaint. Many times I sat late into the night, mending her clothes so meticulously until the candle smoke stung my eyes and my vision blurred, only for her to decide the following day that the stitches were too large and I must unpick them and start again. She was an ingrate.
Lord and Lady Gerard had no money. The household lived on promise alone. Lord G was always in debt, or drunk, or both, lurching from one unhappy scandal to the next, from one syphilitic-ridden mistress to another. He and Lady Gerard could not bear one another. It only astonished me that they had thought to marry in the first place.
Don’t misunderstand me. I hated him too. He was forever angry, violent and unhappy as though driven by devils. It was Lord G who had appointed me her ladyship’s maid two years before and she had accepted without a demur. No doubt she was pleased that I was small and dark and plain beside her fair, glowing prettiness. Lord G might hate her but there were many men about Town who did not. Not one of them looked at me when she was by, and that flattered her vanity.
What she did not know was that I might be her maid but I was Lord Gerard’s spy as well. In that sense I was as contemptible as a whore, bought and paid for. I had to please him. My life depended on it.
Early that morning, before he left for Paris, Lord G called me to his study. He was dressed for travelling, pacing the room as though he were anxious to be off which, given the violent row he had had with his wife the previous night, hardly surprised me.
‘Lawrence,’ he said, on seeing me. ‘I have a task for you.’
It was not the first time.
‘Yes, my lord?’ I cast my gaze meekly on the floor the way he liked me to do.
‘The golden gown I gave my wife last night.’ He was standing directly in front of me. I could see his boots, highly polished, against the colourful pattern of the carpet. ‘I want you to destroy it.’
I knew better than to question Lord G, no matter what it was he demanded of me. I knew better than to speculate on why he acted as he did. I kept my mind blank and my voice quiet.
‘Yes, my lord.’
‘You must do as I say. It is imperative.’ He took my chin in his hand and forced my face up so that I met his eyes. They were fierce, as was the frown between his brows. He looked very angry but then I had never known him otherwise.
‘Yes, my lord,’ I repeated.
His hand tightened about my jaw. ‘And no one must know. Do you understand?’ He gave me a little shake. My teeth chattered.
I could not have spoken had I wished, but he must have read my acquiescence in my eyes for he nodded and released me. My chin felt bruised, registering the imprint of his fingers. ‘Good girl.’ He moved away from me; turned back. ‘Your family are all well, I hope?’
I felt a chill. Here was the reminder, the threat, to ram home the need for me to obey. ‘They are all very well, thank you, my lord.’
‘Good.’ His look was sharp, matching his tone. ‘Make sure you keep it that way. We would not wish the authorities to enquire too closely into your father’s business, would we?’
I felt a flash of hatred. ‘No, my lord.’
He nodded. ‘Off you go then, Lawrence. Oh—’ His voice stopped me at the door. ‘Be sure to write to me with the details of how Lady Gerard progresses.’
You would think he was concerned for her welfare but I knew better. He wanted to know who she saw, where she went, what she did. As I said, I was his spy.
A half hour later, the door banged behind him as he left for Paris and a gloomy quiet settled on the house. I crept upstairs to the dressing room, anxious not to disturb my lady, since she was always in a bad mood early in the morning.
The door to her bedroom was ajar. I could hear her snoring and was relieved that she slept. I had imagined that she would lie awake all night in pain, tormented by the terrible argument and the violence that had followed. But perhaps she was sick and exhausted. I should feel more sympathy for her. Yet I did not. Many men enforced their will through their fists. It was a fact of life. Besides, her ladyship provoked her husband with her flirtations. I was her maid so I knew all about the late night trysts and the whispered promises, the dallying in the dark walks at Vauxhall. What did she expect in return? Not many men happily accepted that what was sauce for the goose was also sauce for the gander. It was a matter of pride to them, a matter of reputation.
Pale light from a crack between the curtains glimmered on the material of the golden gown. It lay across the back of one of the chairs where Lord G had thrown it when her ladyship had declined to wear it. All I had to do was creep into the room and take it before she woke. I could destroy it as Lord G had demanded and when – if – she asked me, I would pretend I knew nothing of it.
‘Constance?’
Too late. She had woken. It was her ‘pity me’ voice.
I pushed open the door and went in.
‘Madam?’
‘Call Dr Baird. I need him. At once.’
My heart beat a little faster. I could not help myself. At one time I had imagined myself marrying Dr Baird. Why should I not? He was handsome and clever, and I was an educated woman, suitable to be the wife of a professional man even if I was only a lady’s maid. He would smile on me sometimes. We would exchange a few words. That was all it took for me to fall in love with him and I allowed myself to dream that we might be together.
One night I did more than merely dream. I called by his lodgings to collect some medicine for my lady. I should have sent the footman, of course, but she insisted on discretion and that I should be her messenger. So I went.
He seemed quite different that night. He was in his shirtsleeves, his neck cloth undone, a bottle of red wine on the table by his chair and a fire in the grate. I joined him in a glass and sat with him in the warmth and we talked, and when he kissed me and drew me down to lie with him before the fire I had no thought of resisting. I was full of joy.
But I soon saw that what was, for me, infinitely precious, was to him… well, I know not what. Nothing out of the ordinary, perhaps, a diversion, or even a mistake.
It did not take me long to realise that Dr Baird was even more ambitious than I. He would never again look my way, other than to ask me to pass him a bowl of water with which to tend to Lady Gerard. Knowing that did not stop me loving him, of course, but it did curdle that loving into bitterness.
‘Constance. You’re dreaming.’ Her voice snapped sharp enough for a sick woman. And I automatically dropped a curtsey.
‘Your pardon, my lady.’ I was so adept at being meek.
I went to find a footman to run the errand. When I returned, my lady was reclining on her pillows so that the light accentuated her pallor and the bruising to her eye and cheek. She was a talented artist and could never resist a pose. I turned away in disgust.
‘Constance, fetch me my yellow peignoir.’ She was looking around, fussing. ‘And tidy the room. Not that—’ She spoke sharply as I reached over to grab the golden gown from the back of the chair. ‘Leave it. Fetch me tea. I don’t want toast. I cannot eat.’
‘My lady.’ My mother would have been proud of my obedience. She had told me from the first what an honour it was to have been chosen to wait upon Lady Gerard. Poor Mother. She understood nothing: nothing of the role Lord G had selected for me, nothing of his hold over our family and nothing of the world she inhabited or the price at which it had been bought.
Dr Baird came, hasty as you like. He had eyes for no one but my lady, of course. Even when she had been treated so cruelly she was like a rose, all pink and amber, delicate, precious. He was dazzled. She was helpless. I was so sick with jealousy I could not look at either of them.
I showed the good doctor out after he had made his foolish suggestion to elope with her and she had turned him down. ‘He is smitten with you,’ I said. I wanted to know her feelings even though I knew I should leave well alone.
‘You have too soft a heart,’ she said. ‘What would you have me do? Accept his attentions?’
She was so callous. It mattered nothing to her that she had enchanted him. She took it as her due and she felt nothing in return.
‘He only wanted to help you,’ I said.
‘There is always a price.’ She sounded weary. She took a sip of tea but the pot was cold by now.
‘I’ll call for more.’ I was glad of the distraction, glad to be able to subdue my unruly feelings with practical matters. I rang the bell then noticed that she was looking at the golden gown. I remembered again Lord Gerard’s instructions and my heart leapt with anxiety.
‘I’ll take it away, milady.’ I said. ‘You won’t be wanting to look at it again, I daresay, after what happened.’
She gave me a look. ‘By all means,’ she said haughtily. Then, just as I thought the deed was so easily accomplished: ‘Wrap it up and put it away. I may want to have it altered someday.’
I spoke before I thought. ‘You wouldn’t wear it, surely? Not now!’
She raised her brows and looked down her aristocratic nose at me. ‘Who knows?’ she said. ‘Perhaps I may, one day.’
‘Very well, milady,’ I said. In truth I was vexed almost beyond bearing. There was no knowing when she might want to see it again. She might choose to have it altered tomorrow or she might never ask for it again. It would be typical of her contrariness that if I destroyed it as Lord Gerard had ordered, she would demand to wear it the very next day, and then how would I explain myself?
I was about to take the gown and fold it away whilst I thought about what to do, but she snatched it up and clutched it to her bosom as though it had suddenly become very precious to her. She closed her eyes for a moment and drew in a deep breath. When she opened them again her face was flushed and animated and her eyes bright as stars. It was quite a transformation.
‘Pack my bags, Constance,’ she said. ‘Tomorrow we go to Lydiard.’
I caught my breath. Lydiard Park, one of Lord Gerard’s many estates, was close by my family home in Swindon. In the two years that I had been serving my lady we had never gone there.
I must have been gaping like a simpleton for she gave me a smile. ‘You will be pleased to see your parents again, I imagine.’
Pleased? Pleased to return to Swindon, where my father had sold me into Lord Gerard’s service, pleased to enter once more into that web of deception and criminality? It was not the word that I would have chosen. What pleased me was to be as far from Swindon and the smuggling gangs as I could possibly be.
When I did not reply, Lady Gerard turned away. She was not particularly interested in my emotions, being far more concerned with her own.
‘Dr Baird was correct,’ she said. ‘Fresh country air and a change of scene will be most restorative.’
‘Yes, milady. Do the childen accompany us?’ Lady Gerard looked astonished. ‘Good God, no. They stay here in the nursery.’
I started to run through in my mind all the things that we would need to take. Suddenly there was so much to do. My lady was at her querulous worst, sending me running hither and thither on endless errands, demanding that I pack a dozen gowns and then removing them immediately from the portmanteau in favour of a different style, despatching me to the perfumer, the haberdasher and the bookseller. By evening I was hot and sweaty and exhausted whilst my lady turned the house on its head in her haste to be gone.
‘You will bring the golden gown with us,’ she ordered at one point, thrusting it into my hands. I could not see that she would have opportunity to wear the wretched thing but I had more pressing matters to think of so I folded it small and forced it into an empty corner of the last box. Perhaps when we were in the country she might forget about it and I could destroy it as Lord G had demanded.
Eventually, when her ladyship had driven us all, coachman, maids, footmen and the cook to utter distraction with her orders for the following day, I had the idea of giving her some of the dose Dr Baird had left to alleviate the pain. She had not asked for it, but it was laudanum and it made her sleep.
I dragged myself wearily up the wooden stairs to my room under the eaves. It was stifling hot in there as evening fell over the city and though I opened the tiny window that was too high up to give me a view, no air stirred. First I packed my own small portmanteau and then I sat down at the bare wooden table and drew from the drawer paper, quill and ink.
‘My lord,’ I wrote, ‘I write to acquaint you with Lady Gerard’s business.’ The letter would not reach him for ten days or more, I knew, but he expected me to provide a regular report. ‘This morning she sent for Dr Baird who recommended that she spend some time in the country.’ I paused, biting the end of the quill, trying to decide whether to mention the doctor’s indiscretion, tantamount to a declaration. It would be malicious of me to write of it when Lady Gerard had very properly declined his offer but the sour resentment I felt towards them both had my pen scurrying across the page.
‘The doctor offered Lady Gerard his personal assistance.’ I underlined the last two words. That would be sufficient to have Dr Baird dismissed, which gave me great satisfaction.
‘We travel to Lydiard House in the morning,’ I finished.
I paused again, looking at the candle flame as it burned low. Should I lie or should I omit?
‘I have completed the other commission you required of me,’ I wrote. ‘The gown has been destroyed.’
Chapter 4
Fenella
Present Day
Fen caught the last train from London Paddington to Hungerford. Swindon station would have been much closer but there was a bus replacement service yet again for part of the journey and she did not relish walking through the centre of Reading at midnight for the privilege of being stuck on a coach for another hour.
She took a window seat in the first of the two carriages, only realising when a businessman in a striped shirt wheezed into the seat beside her that she was trapped. She felt a moment of panic, the old feeling of sickness in the pit of her stomach, her pulse racing. Then the man settled back onto the seat with a waft of stale sweat and a contented sigh and she almost laughed aloud. The train was packed and she was safer with this bulwark between her and the crowds.
She could feel the tide of friendship and laughter starting to wear off now, like champagne left open. Perhaps it was because she hadn’t actually had any champagne – knowing she was driving later had been her excuse but the truth was she did not trust herself after a few glasses. It was very easy to lose what small shreds of self she had left.
These days she didn’t go up to London often. She had lived there with Jake for eight years but oddly her old life felt, at the same time, both distant and dangerously near. Her old friends seemed such a long way away that even when she was sitting in the club with them it was as though they were on a far shore and she was an observer not a participant. She had tried so hard, laughed, danced, and chatted as much as she could above the pounding beat of the music. They had all known that something had changed. She had seen it in the puzzled smiles and the slight awkwardness. No one understood why they could not go back to how it had been before. No one mentioned it though, not even Kesia, who had been the person who had invited her in the first place.
‘We’ll go somewhere new,’ she had said when she had called Fen. ‘Somewhere you never went with Jake. Don’t worry,’ she had added, taking Fen’s silence for impending refusal. ‘I know you’re still a bit iffy about going out but we’ll all look after you.’
‘I know you will,’ Fen said. She had injected some warmth into her voice. ‘Thanks. You have all been fabulous.’
‘So you’ll come?’ Kesia sounded eager. ‘Please do, Fen. We miss you. Jessie’s gutted she can’t be there too but Dev is whisking her away somewhere for their anniversary.’
‘She told me,’ Fen said. Jessie was still her best friend, the one constant in a life that had changed almost out of recognition. Her schoolgirl friendship with Kesia had survived too although Kes had been abroad travelling a lot. She was back in London now and keen to meet up with everyone, hence the invitation.
‘You can’t keep hiding away,’ Kesia said now. ‘It’s been two years, Fen. Show that loser he can’t ruin your life.’
Fen appreciated the sentiment even if it was expressed somewhat insensitively. She no longer wanted to scream when people gave their opinion about her relationship with Jake. They had absolutely no idea what she had been through but she had accepted that now. She simply closed her ears to the words and accepted the clumsy kindness in the spirit it was meant.
‘Well…’ she said cautiously.
‘You’ll come!’ Kesia said instantly. ‘Fantastic!’
Of course Fen had agreed. She acknowledged now that refusal had been impossible. Kesia, Laura and the others were amongst her oldest friends and they loved her. They had all stuck together through thick and thin, through college and awful first jobs and slightly less awful second ones. There had been marriages, children, divorces, affairs, all the successes and disasters of life. They had celebrated and commiserated, fixed the problems with wine and conversation like old friends did.
Murder was different, though.
Murder was unfixable.
It had been an accident. Everyone said so, even the police. They had not pressed charges. Only she knew different.
‘Don’t leave me,’ Jake had pleaded. He had been very white. ‘I love you. Why would you walk out on me when we’ve been through so much together?’
She had withstood his emotional blackmail that final time and she had gone, as she should have done years before, changed her name back, changed her appearance, changed her job, her home, her life. Yet the old one dogged her footsteps like a nagging shadow. She understood now that no one ever escaped their past, no matter how hard or fast they ran. You took it with you; it was a part of you.
The train trundled into another station. It was stopping at every town and village between London and Newbury, or so it seemed. Fen glanced over her shoulder through habit but it was so dark outside and so brightly lit in the carriage that she could see nothing. It made her feel unpleasantly vulnerable, a sitting duck, even if there was no one out there, watching for her.
The businessman got off at Reading. Fen watched him heave himself out of the seat and take his briefcase down from the rack overhead. There were dark sweat patches under his arms. She wondered if she was stereotyping him; city worker, a banker perhaps, expense account dinners, high blood pressure. She wondered what people thought when they saw her. Normally she dressed to be invisible. Tonight she had tried to dress the way she had done in the old days, in her favourite sequin skirt and white crop top, nude heels. She had straightened her hair so that the haphazard blonde waves were tamed into a shiny fall. She had even worn make-up. It felt as though she was in disguise. She had changed her appearance so many times over the past two years that she did not really know what she looked like anymore: glasses or lenses, brunette or buttermilk blonde, heels or flats, smart or vintage, real or a total fake.
The train started to move again. She reached into her bag for the book that Laura had given her, Black Sheep by Georgette Heyer, an old favourite from their college days.
Someone sat down beside her and she glanced up.
‘Evening.’ He nodded, smiled. It felt odd, courteous but ridiculously old-fashioned to be greeted formally by a complete stranger who had randomly chosen to sit next to her on a train. She almost smiled because it was so sweet.
‘Hi.’ She looked back down at her book. Then she looked up again. She couldn’t help herself. She might be single by choice but she wasn’t immune. Thirties, dark hair falling across his brow, deep brown eyes, good-looking without being devastating… There was something about him that drew her gaze. The hard line of his cheekbones and jaw made him look uncompromising in a way that might have intimidated her had it not been for his smile, which was dangerously disarming.
He yanked his tie off as though it constricted his breathing and undid his top button, resting his head against the seat back, closing his eyes. Fen realised that she was staring.
She went back to her book. The train was picking up speed. Brief flashes of streetlights, car headlights and isolated houses punctured the darkness outside. The interior of the train was so bright in contrast that it made her head ache. The familiar words on the page blurred before her eyes.
‘Haven’t we met before?’ The man had turned towards her and opened his eyes. They were a very dark hazel rather than brown. Nice.
Fen sighed. As a pick-up line it was extremely lame.
‘No, I don’t think we have,’ she said.
‘Sorry.’ He sounded crestfallen. ‘I know it’s a cliché.’
‘Yes, it is.’ Fen could feel herself warming to him against her will. It was disconcerting. That easy smile was too charming. She felt a surprise tug of attraction and thought that at another time, in another life, she might have liked him very much.
‘I’m too old to indulge in wretchedly poor chat-up lines,’ he said. ‘I really did think that there was a connection between us though.’
‘If you say so.’ Fen buried her nose back in her book. Time passed. She realised she had not read a line, nor turned a page.
‘Is it a good book?’
She wasn’t expecting further conversation. It startled her.
‘Sorry?’
‘I asked if it was a good book.’
‘Um… it’s okay.’ She felt a little off-balance and answered at random. ‘I used to love it when I was younger. But it was written a while ago and it feels a bit dated to me now.’
He tilted his head to read the title and author. ‘Georgette Heyer,’ he said. ‘I’ve never heard of her.’
‘Wow,’ Fen said blankly. She had never met anyone who hadn’t heard of Heyer.
He laughed. ‘Thanks for making me feel illiterate,’ he said dryly.
Fen realised she had been rude. She blushed with embarrassment. Then she met his eyes, saw the amusement there, and realised that probably very little, least of all her bluntness, could dent this man’s confidence. There was a core of steel beneath that easy manner.
‘Is she famous, Georgette Heyer?’ he said. ‘Have any of her books been made into films?’
Fen made an effort. ‘Uh… no, I don’t think so,’ she said. ‘She’s dead. Maybe they did a while ago.’ She smiled despite herself. ‘Though I don’t expect you would have come across them if they had. You don’t look like a fan of Forties and Fifties costume drama.’
‘Don’t judge,’ the man said mildly. ‘You never know.’ He looked cramped in the train seat, folded in, his legs too long for a comfortable fit. She could not look at him properly without turning sideways and that felt too blatant. She did not want to give the impression that she was interested. She wanted to go back to the book for the protection it gave her, but the archaic language seemed unappealing all of a sudden.
‘You’re right, as it happens,’ he said. ‘Thrillers, action films… That’s my sort of thing. Very conventional.’
Fen never read crime or thriller novels. There was enough darkness in real life.
‘Why pick it up if you don’t enjoy it?’ the man asked.
Fen gave up, putting the book away in her bag. ‘It was a present,’ she said.
‘Birthday?’
‘No, just…’ She let the sentence fade. What had it been: an attempt to recreate the past? An apology?
‘Just a gift from a friend,’ she said. ‘We hadn’t met up for a while. A few of us had dinner together.’
‘In London?’ Like her he must know this was the last train.
‘Yes.’ She made an effort and wondered why she was bothering. ‘You?’
‘I’ve been at work.’ He closed his eyes, massaging the back of his neck. ‘Nothing exciting. I’m hoping to be made redundant.’
‘Then you’re going about it the wrong way,’ Fen said, ‘working late.’
He opened his eyes and smiled at her. Wow again. She blinked.
‘I suppose so,’ he said. ‘Hadn’t thought of that.’
‘What would you do if you were made redundant?’ Fen asked.
He thought about it for a moment. There was nothing rushed about him, nothing that wasn’t thoughtful and considered.
‘I’d go travelling,’ he said, after a moment, ‘and write about it.’
‘Nice.’
‘Nothing exotic,’ he continued. ‘Just local. It’s beautiful around here, you know?’ He waved a hand towards the blank train windows. ‘The river and the landscape, the water meadows, the hills…’
‘I’m not familiar with the countryside around here,’ Fen said. She remembered the view from the window earlier as she had travelled up; fields of honey-coloured corn in the sunlight, pale green hills, the curl of the river in the lazy haze. ‘I can see it can be beautiful,’ she said, ‘but what about all the bits in between – the railway sidings and industrial units and shopping parks?’
‘There’s always bits in between,’ he said. ‘Anyway,’ he settled his shoulders back against the seat, ‘it’s just a dream.’
There was silence again, the rattle of the train, the hum of the wheels on the line. They were slowing down into another station.
‘What about you?’ he asked.
She wanted to tell him that she didn’t want to talk about herself but it seemed too much effort. What about her? What was she now? Who was she? Fenella Brightwell, twenty-seven years old and starting her life over again…
‘I’m a writer.’ She chose a job at random, perhaps because she could still see the corner of the book sticking out of her bag. It didn’t matter what she said when she wasn’t going to see him again. Licence to lie was how she thought of it. Her past, her new beginning, gave her the right to pretend.
His eyes gleamed. She wasn’t sure whether he believed her but it didn’t matter.
‘That’s exciting. What sort of books do you write?’
‘Science fiction.’
‘Are you published?’
‘Yes.’
‘Does anyone beyond your family and friends actually buy your books?’
Fen smothered a laugh. Suddenly she was enjoying this.
‘Yes. Quite a few people.’
‘Are you a bestseller, then?’
This time she laughed aloud. ‘No, of course not.’
He raised his brows. ‘Lots of authors are.’
‘Proportionally few.’ She knew that; the world was flooded with books. Very few of them were by people anyone had heard of.
She noticed for the first time his crumpled but elegant suit and the expensive watch on his wrist. How awkward if he were a rich and successful author. He’d said something about writing about his travels. But he had also said he was hoping to be made redundant so he couldn’t be self-employed. He probably worked in IT. A lot of big companies were based in Reading. IT, or insurance or banking. Something boring. Something normal.
‘I’ll look out for your books,’ he said. ‘Do you write under your own name?’
‘No,’ Fen said. She hesitated, enough to give herself away. ‘My pen name is Julie Butler.’ Where the hell had that come from?
‘And your latest book?’ The gleam was back in his eyes. He knew she was making this up. ‘What’s that called?’
‘It’s called…’ She saw a hoarding flash past with an advertisement for moisturiser. ‘The Dove Flies Out.’
‘Intriguing.’ He smiled at her. ‘What’s it about?’
‘It’s set on a spaceship,’ Fen said. ‘A spaceship like an ark. They send the dove out when they get near a new planet, to see if it’s suitable for landing.’
‘Imaginative.’
More like imaginary, Fen thought. ‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘People usually say that when they think something sounds awful.’
‘I’ll look out for it when I’m next in town.’ He stood up and for one moment she thought he was going to shake hands but he didn’t. ‘This is my stop,’ he said. ‘It was nice to meet you, Julie Butler.’
‘You too,’ Fen said. She thought of the old days, the days before Jake. She would have asked for his number, or given him hers. They might have met up and had a drink. It would have been good to see him again. There was a connection there, a spark. But perhaps she had read too much into it. She wasn’t good at relationships.
The signs for Newbury slid past the train window. She watched him stroll down the carriage to the door, waiting with the cyclists, the late shoppers and the suits, standing back to let an elderly couple get to their feet. He turned and looked at her. Her gaze met his and she felt the connection between them again like a physical jolt. He walked back to where she sat.
‘In case we meet again,’ he said, ‘or in case we don’t, my name’s Hamish. Hamish Ross.’
‘Hamish,’ she repeated. ‘Well, it was good to talk to you.’
He smiled a last smile and raised a hand, and in that minute Fen realised where she had seen him before. He had been right when he had said that he thought he knew her. It hadn’t been a line.
He was Jessie’s older brother.
She opened her mouth to tell him but it was too late. The doors hissed shut behind him. She did not see him on the platform. There weren’t many people left in the carriage now and the night air from the open windows was making her feel cold. Ten minutes to Hungerford, then she had a half hour’s drive on empty country roads and then home. Not that the flat in Swindon Old Town was home yet. It was too recent and too impersonal.
The car park was deserted. She’d deliberately parked right under one of the huge, bright lights. She walked straight over to the car looking neither left nor right, feeling the cold night air on her face and blinking in the harsh light. Her keys were already in her hand; she slid into the driver’s seat, slammed the door, locked it and took a deep steadying breath. Safe.
She thought about Hamish Ross whilst she drove home. On reflection, she realised it was lucky she hadn’t told him about the link between them since she had also told him a tissue of lies. She tried to remember whether she had seen him at Jessie’s wedding. She thought not, but Jake had monopolised her attention that day. The last time she had spoken to him must have been when she and Jessie had been about fifteen and Hamish had been eighteen and about to go to university. He hadn’t taken much notice of her back in the days when she would go round to Jessie’s for tea. From a purely selfish point of view it was nice to know that she warranted more of his attention now. She hadn’t had a crush on him back then, not really. When you were stuck at an all girls’ school people’s brothers tended to be alien and exotic creatures, especially if they were older. Hamish had been… she searched her memory… nice, she thought, kind to Jessie in an absentminded sort of a way. Patient. He had helped them with their homework sometimes. He had not been so good-looking in those days, or at least she didn’t think so.
She wondered whether he was married. He hadn’t been wearing a ring but that meant nothing. Perhaps he was a player, like Jake had been, a man who hit on a different woman each night on the train home from work. She didn’t know. Although she’d seen Jessie quite a bit since she had come back to Swindon, her friend hadn’t mentioned her brother much. And since Jessie was called Jessie Madan now rather than Jessie Ross, it had taken a moment for the penny to drop.
Fen bit her lip. Damn. She had to hope that Jessie wouldn’t invite her to a party or something that Hamish would also attend. It would be awkward to try to explain how Fen Brightwell had morphed into the novelist Julie Butler. In fact it would be excruciatingly embarrassing. Still, it was unlikely to happen. Whilst Jessie had moved back to a village near Swindon and Hamish evidently lived in Newbury, they weren’t a family who were in each other’s pockets. They seemed fond enough of each other in a nice, mutually supportive way. They were so normal.
Fen sighed, narrowing her eyes against the glare of oncoming headlights, fighting the tiredness that snapped at her heels. She didn’t really know ‘normal’ that well. Her own family background was too fractured and as for her relationship with Jake, that had been so far from normal that there wasn’t a word for it.
She pulled onto the motorway. It was still busy with late night weekend traffic heading for the West Country. She only had one junction to go though. She stifled a yawn and turned on the radio to help her focus. A group of earnest people were talking about literary criticism. She turned it off. That was more likely to lull her to sleep than wake her up. Her sister Pepper was the bookish one with a first-class degree in Archaeology. Her eldest brother Jim was a high-achieving lawyer in Sydney and the younger one, Denzel, was a drifter last heard of surfing in San Diego. They were scattered in character and interests as much as in location, perhaps because they had all had such dislocated childhoods. It had not drawn them back together as adults.
Suddenly the orange haze of streetlights punctured the darkness up ahead and she took the exit, turning right towards Swindon, past the hospital and into upmarket suburbia, the big 1930s houses, the wide open spaces of the country park. After she had left Jake, she had relocated to Manchester and then to the Midlands but she had felt rootless and lost, so after eighteen months she had gone back to Swindon where she had grown up. It felt safe enough; she had not lived there for twelve years and had never told Jake anything about her childhood anyway. Besides, he was living abroad now and probably didn’t give a thought to where she was living or what she was doing. She had to try not to be paranoid. She didn’t want to spend all her life feeling hunted. If she thought about Jake constantly he would still dictate her life, he would have won. She was not going to allow that. Even so, she knew it was not that easy; so often he trod the edges of her mind like a ghost.
She slid the car down the narrow alleyway between the flats and the row of houses next door, a line of old cottages that tumbled down the hill towards the new town. As she turned into the entry, the arc of the headlights caught a man’s figure, stepping sideways into the shadows. She caught only the briefest flash of his features but it was enough.
Jake.
She slammed on the brakes and the car stalled, stranded half-in and half-out of the alley. Without conscious thought she threw open the door, so hard it scraped along the wall, and jumped out, running round the back of the car and out into the street. A horn blared, lights swerved. Someone swore at her but she barely noticed.
The street in both directions was empty. Only the faintest echo of receding footsteps came to her ears. Fen stood there irresolute for a moment then shook her head sharply. It could only have been her imagination. She had been thinking about Jake and so she thought she had seen him when she had not.
She restarted the car and drove around into the parking lot behind the flats, locked it, double-checked, and walked swiftly, head down, across to the entrance where she let herself in. Only when she was in the bright passage, with the door firmly shut behind her, did she allow herself to draw a breath. It had been her mind playing tricks. She told herself that, very firmly, and ignored the slight shaking of her hands.
Chapter 5
Isabella
Lydiard Park, Summer 1763
The clock on the stables was striking quarter past the hour of one as my carriage rattled into the coach yard at Lydiard Park. After so many miles the sudden cessation of noise and movement was shocking. The silence was loud, the stillness made me feel sick.
There was no light outside and no welcome. Not that I was expecting one. I had not sent ahead to warn the servants of our arrival. There had been no time.
The carriage swayed as the coachman jumped down. I wondered if he were as stiff as I, tired, filthy and bad tempered from travelling through the night. He had certainly driven like a man in a rage, sparing us nothing, which had made the journey all the more uncomfortable.
Constance stirred in her seat but she did not wake. Poor child, at the last change of horses she had looked so pale and hollow-eyed from exhaustion that I thought she might faint with the effort of carrying a cup of broth for me, and I made her drink it herself.
I pushed the window down. ‘Farrant! Drive around to the front. Do you expect me to walk?’
I heard him swear. I had suffered the coachman and groom’s snide disrespect all the way from London. How quickly the servants picked up on the mood of their master and acted accordingly. They all knew about Eustace’s treatment of me and so they thought that gave them licence to behave with insolence. But I was a Duke’s daughter; I knew how to deal with impertinent servants.
‘Ma’am—’ Tarrant’s surly response was interrupted as a wavering light appeared, a lantern held in the hand of a very young ostler who scuffed his way across the cobbles, yawning and rubbing his eyes. Behind him I saw the shadow of a cat slink away.
‘What’s to do?’ His Wiltshire burr was so thick I could scarcely make out the words. ‘Who calls at this time of night?’
‘It is my Lady Gerard.’ The coachman was peremptory, using my authority to bolster his own now it suited him. ‘Look sharp, lad, and send someone to wake the house, and fetch more men to help with the horses.’
‘There’s no one here but me.’ The poor lad sounded panicked, as though he did not know what to do first. I took pity on him, leaning from the window.
‘Farrant, open this door. I can announce myself at the house.’ Turning, I shook Constance awake gently. Her shoulder felt brittle beneath my hand and she turned her head against the velvet cushions of the seat as though for comfort.
‘Come, Constance,’ I said. ‘You are home.’
She opened sleep-dazed dark eyes and looked at me, waking suddenly, despite the care I had taken not to startle her.
‘Home? Lydiard? Oh, madam!’
She scrambled up and thrust the door wide, jumping down before the groom had stirred to come and help us. I smiled wryly to think that one of us at least was pleased to be here.
I had not been to Lydiard since the first year of my marriage. I had been happy enough then, although perhaps not as happy as I should have been as a new bride. Marriage had not been at all as I had imagined.
‘What on earth were you thinking, Bella?’ my sister Betty had asked bluntly when my betrothal was announced. ‘Were you drunk? Everyone says you must have been to accept Eustace Gerard.’
It was true that Eustace had proposed to me at Vauxhall Spring Gardens but I had been quite sober that night. It had been a whim, an impulse, I suppose. He had offered escape, or so I had thought, and I had been bored with my pattern card life as a young lady of the ton and had grasped after something different. In those days Eustace had made me laugh. He made no such efforts to amuse a wife. I drew my cloak a little closer about me. For all that this was July the air was chill and fresh out here in the country. It had a different quality to London.
The lad from the stables had run on ahead to raise the house whilst the groom and coachman dealt with the horses. By the time that Constance and I reached the door, there was a lantern flaring in the hall and Pound, the steward, was shrugging on his jacket and hurrying towards us, cross and flustered. His shirt flapped loose and his hair stood up at the back.
‘My lady!’ His gaze darted to my face and registered my bruises with the mere flick of an eyelid before he resorted to his true grievance. ‘We did not expect you! If you had told us—’
I raised a hand to stem the flow of reproach. I was too weary to hear him out. ‘It is of no consequence. All I require is my usual room made up and some hot water and a little food…’
He looked appalled. Such simple matters seemed impossible to achieve. For the first time I looked about the hall and saw what the darkness and lamplight had concealed: the cobwebs and dust, the filthy drapes. There was a smell of stale air and old candle wax. It was cold. Probably there were rats.
‘Surely,’ I said, my voice sharpening, ‘my lord pays you to maintain his house in an appropriate style even when he is not present?’
Pound’s face pursed up like a prune. ‘Had we known to expect you—’ he repeated.
‘You should always expect me. I do not have to give you notice of my whereabouts.’
‘No, my lady.’ His expression smoothed away into blandness but I knew that for all the outward show, he was annoyed. That, however, was not my concern.
Constance, looking from one of us to the other, stepped forward. ‘I can go to find some food and some hot water, milady,’ she said, ‘if Mr Pound can raise the housekeeper and see to your room.’
Constance was always the peacemaker. Probably Pound was some distant cousin of hers; she came from a village only a few miles distant and everyone in those parts was related to one another.
‘I’ll wait in the drawing room,’ I said. ‘Thank you, Constance.’
Pound’s gaze flickered between us, hard to read. He seemed surprised that I addressed Constance by her first name. It was not the custom but with a personal maid I always felt the need to be less formal. We were friends of a kind, after all. She dropped a curtsey and sped off towards the kitchen passage. Pound followed more slowly, adjusting his jacket and smoothing his hair for the housekeeper’s benefit if not for mine.
The drawing room was as unwelcoming as the hall. There was no light so I went back to the hall and took a branch of candles from the table by the door. From upstairs came the sound of voices raised in altercation. I had not met the Lydiard housekeeper and did not know her name but it seemed she had a fine pair of lungs even if she did not know how to keep house.
Pulling one of the covers off a chair I sat down and waited. Even with the candlelight the room looked sad and dark. Shrouded pictures of Eustace’s ancestors looked down their Gerard noses at me as though I, the daughter of a Duke, was not good enough to marry a mere Viscount. No light or warmth had penetrated here during the day and I thought I smelt damp plaster. The grand marble fireplace yawned cold and empty, full of the winter’s ashes. I wondered for a moment why I had come here, to the end of the world, and then I remembered. I remembered the golden gown, I remembered Eustace’s violence and I remembered that I planned to be revenged on him. Here, at Lydiard, I would settle the score.
Constance was the perfect accomplice. I knew she was Eustace’s spy. She had been from the moment he appointed her as my maid. They both thought I was unaware of it but I had known all along. It did not matter to me; she was useful in passing on the information I wished Eustace to receive and now I would use her to lure Eustace to Lydiard so that I could deal with him.
I think I must have fallen asleep where I sat, for when I woke, the candles had gone out and the room was full of darkness and silence. I felt cold, stiff and confused, my mind fogged with dreams. I stumbled to my feet, clumsily bumping into the corner of a table, reaching out to steady myself but touching nothing but thin air. Why had everyone left me alone in the dark? I felt both forlorn and furious at the same time.
A sliver of light showed in the corner of the room and I groped my way towards it. My fingers met the smooth panels of a door and the hard edge of the doorknob. I turned it and realised that I was in the little dressing room that lay in the north-east corner of the house, facing the church. Faint light fell through the window with its intricate painted diamond panes, suggesting that dawn was coming. I stood for a moment watching the strengthening light deepening the colours in the glass. I had loved that window from the first moment I had seen it. It had given me so many ideas for my drawing and painting; Eustace had laughingly said the room must become my studio.
But this was odd. If I was in the little dressing room then I could only have come through the door in the corner of the grand bedroom and not from the drawing room, where I had sat down and apparently fallen asleep… And now I looked about it, the room was much changed, painted in blue with a strange-looking desk all gold and black in the alcove, and on the walls were drawings, pastels and sketches in a hand I immediately recognised as my own.
Except that the pictures were unfamiliar, and their subjects and settings were completely unknown to me.
A long, cold shiver ran along my skin. I walked up to them to stare more closely. The room was as bright as day now but I had not noticed the change at once because I was too intent on the images on the wall. There was a charming pastel of a woman and a child holding hands and dancing, a drawing of three little rounded cupids sporting together and there, in the corner of the room, a pencil sketch of an elegant lady seated on a terrace with a little dog curled up on a cushion beside her.
There could be no mistake. I knew my own style and design as one does a hand so familiar that it is instinctive. I turned slowly to take them all in and saw a watercolour of a spray of flowers I had seen in a hedgerow in spring. I had taken a rough copy of them in my notebook and here they were in a painted panel, pale pink and white on blue, entwined with leaves, just as I had envisaged drawing them. There was china and porcelain adorned with the same sorts of patterns. And there, on the shiny black top of the desk, was a portrait framed in wood of a very pretty girl. It was signed with the initials I.A.C.B. I leaned closer to read the square piece of card beneath: ‘ A stipple engraving published by John Boydell in 1782 after Lady Isabella’s 1779 painting of her friend and cousin Lady Georgiana Cavendish.’
I sat down very abruptly in the little wicker chair by the desk.
We were in the year 1763.
I knew nothing of a John Boydell who published stipple engravings.
As for the china and porcelain, a lady might draw and paint but she did not produce designs for commercial use.
And my cousin was Lady Georgiana Spencer, not Lady Georgiana Cavendish and she was a sweet child of six years.
Then there was I.A.C.B., the artist who had drawn the portrait… I wrapped my arms about myself to drive away the cold that possessed me. Isabella, Ann and Charlotte were my names, and suddenly I knew with the insight of a soothsayer, a witch, that I was the artist. The Isabella whose work was displayed here inhabited my future…
‘My lady? Madam?’ It was Constance’s voice from beyond the doorway. I jumped like a startled cat. The light was fading again and the pale blue walls seemed to shimmer. I gripped the arm of the chair so that the wood scored my fingers. I needed the reassurance of the pain to convince me I was not in a dream.
Light wavered across the floor and then there was Constance, a branch of candles in her hand. ‘There you are,’ she said, sounding so surprised that the deference had gone from her voice. ‘Why would you sit in here in the dark?’
The room, revealed in the soft golden light, was the one that I knew. The window was the same and the beautiful plaster of the ceiling, but here too the furniture was now covered in cloth and there was nothing on the walls other than an oil of a rather angry-looking dog standing over the prone body of a dead hare. I remembered Eustace telling me that it was a favourite of his father’s.
Constance was still looking at me curiously but she had remembered her manners now. ‘There is food in the drawing room, ma’am,’ she said, ‘if you would care to come through. The water is heating and your chamber is almost ready. Mrs Lunt apologises for the delay and will present herself to you directly.’
‘Thank you,’ I said. I followed her out into the grand bedchamber, glancing back over my shoulder at the little dressing room. It had fallen into darkness.
I.A.C.B.… If this really were me then by the time the portrait was published I would have a different surname. I would be remarried. Eustace would be dead.
The thought gave me enormous pleasure. It warmed me, nurturing the flame of revenge that burned deep inside. I felt new life and energy course through my veins again, just as I had when I had held the golden gown. I decided that whilst I planned Eustace’s demise I would start to draw again.
‘I shall set up my easel in that room tomorrow,’ I said to Constance. ‘The light is perfect for my art. Please talk to Mrs Lunt to make sure it is clean and ready for me in the morning. There is much I need to do.’
Chapter 6
Fenella
Present Day
There was a parcel waiting for Fen on the walnut table in the hall when she arrived home from work on Monday. It was unexpected and she felt her heart contract with a little lurch of fear just as it always did when something unforeseen happened. It felt as though these days she had no protective layer. Everything had been stripped away when she had walked out on her past life and as yet she had not been able to reconstruct herself.
Since Friday night she had felt on edge anyway, jumping at shadows. She knew she must have imagined seeing Jake. He lived in Berlin these days, or so she had been told. Yet just the thought that she could summon up his ghost so easily, chilled her. She had spent the day trying to forget, immersed in work, the seminars and tutorials with her students, discussions on design ideas with colleagues, her research. The routine and familiarity had restored some of her equilibrium but term was ending and soon the college corridors would be echoing and empty through the long weeks of summer. She already felt lonely and vulnerable.
‘There’s a special delivery for you,’ her landlord said. He had come out of his own flat when he heard the main door open. He had a mop in his hand but Fen knew he had no intention of cleaning the tiled hall. For a start it was spotless, and secondly, he employed a whole team of cleaners to service the flats. It was part of the rental agreement.
‘It was lucky I was here to sign for it,’ he said. ‘Otherwise they would have taken it away again.’
‘Thanks,’ Fen said. She hadn’t talked to him much in the six months she had been back in Swindon. She knew he was called Dave and that he shared his flat with a male partner and that he ran a small property empire from within the elegant Georgian building. That was about all, other than that he used the mop as an excuse to engage the tenants in conversation whenever he heard the door open.
‘It’s postmarked Norfolk,’ Dave said. He waited, clearly hoping for some information in return.
Fen glanced at the scrawled address which looked as though it had been written in a hurry by someone who couldn’t give a toss whether the parcel arrived at its destination or not. She thought it odd to send it special delivery if they couldn’t even be bothered with a proper postcode. Then she realised that it was Pepper’s writing, which explained everything. Pepper’s life was one long impatient scrawl.
‘It’s from my sister,’ she said.
‘Lives there, does she?’ Dave’s eyebrows waggled with excitement.
‘No,’ Fen said. ‘She’s clearing out my grandmother’s cottage in Hunstanton. Gran died a couple of months ago.’
‘Condolences.’ Dave rubbed vigorously at an imaginary spot on the coloured tiles. ‘I hope she had a good innings?’
‘She did, thanks,’ Fen said. It was hard to speak about Sarah without feeling a multitude of emotions, of which grief and regret were very close to the top of the list. Everything had gone wrong with their relationship. When Fen had reached sixteen she had headed out into the world like a bird freed from a cage. She had only wanted a bit of breathing space after the claustrophobic years of caring for Sarah but no one had understood. Her family had thought she was an ingrate. Sarah wrote her vitriolic letters accusing her of wilful cruelty. Even Pepper had called her selfish.
‘Really, darling,’ her mother had said plaintively, from an archaeological dig in Greece, ‘you’re throwing away all your future chances without a decent education. No one who leaves school at sixteen has a hope in hell of making anything of themselves. And what about your grandmother? Who’s supposed to care for her now you’ve gone? I’ve had to call in an army of carers and that is so expensive!’
Fen had felt bad about that, abandoning Sarah to flea markets and the bottle, but it had felt as though something might snap in her head if she didn’t get out. Jessie, knowing something was wrong even though Fen hadn’t spilled the details, had tried to persuade her to go to stay with them so that she could carry on at school, but Fen had needed to get right away, put some distance between her and Swindon for a while. Kesia had a cousin in London and Fen had gone to stay with her, got a job as a waitress and moved from job to job, rented flat to rented flat, until she had met Jake, an importer of luxury goods, and he had helped her get work as a secretary. It wasn’t what she wanted to do for ever but she had only been twenty and she had thought there would be plenty of time to decide on a proper future, and whatever her mother thought, there were plenty of opportunities…
She picked up the parcel, which was much lighter than she had expected from its size, and carried it up the stairs at the rear of the hall. Muted summer sunshine fell on her from the fanlight high above her head, mingling with drifting shadow. She had never lived in an old house before but found it pleasantly cool in the heat of these July days. She had been surprised to find how much she liked the Georgian style of Villet House, with its panelled hall and carved oak stairs. Her flat was on the first floor; two bedrooms, a spacious living area with a big bow window to the street at the front, a tiny kitchen and bathroom and a view out across the car parks and rooftops behind. It wasn’t the most attractive view in the world but if she craned her neck she could see the green haze of the trees in the park, the spire of Christ Church and the rows of houses leading down the hill into Swindon New Town.
She put the parcel down on her dining table and went into the kitchen to pour a glass of water. She felt hot and sticky from the walk home even though the college was only five minutes away. Her hair smelt of diesel fumes from the buses and it felt as though there was a layer of summer dust overlaying her skin. She needed a shower.
Halfway down the hall she realised that she had forgotten to put the chain on the door. It shocked her to be so careless. Vigilance was a habit with her. She fumbled for the links with fingers that shook and slid it into place.
The cold shower restored some of her calm. She knew she had changed since leaving Jake; she was much more wary, less open with people and, no matter how she tried, the lurking sense of unease was never far away. People spoke of starting a new life as though it were fresh and exciting. What they didn’t realise was that you could not shake off the past. It was in your head, sometimes, even in the marks on your body.
It was too hot to eat. She was meeting some colleagues from work in the wine bar on Wood Street at eight and knew she should at least have a salad or something small before she had anything to drink. Not that she was likely to say something she shouldn’t but there was always a chance she might forget which story she was telling today, who she was… She never talked about her real past, not with those people who had not known her before. She did not know any of them well enough to trust them and she didn’t want to talk about it anyway; why rake it all up, dissect it again, see the shock and pity in people’s eyes? It had been hard enough with family and friends at the time:
‘But we all thought Jake was so charming,’ they had wailed as a chorus and the look in their eyes had so often suggested that she must have been at fault and that it was her judgement that in some way was suspect…
As she tossed some basil, mozzarella, sliced tomatoes and avocado into a bowl and sloshed in some olive oil, Fen caught sight of the parcel, still sitting on the table, waiting. She realised she didn’t want to open it. She had no idea what her sister could have sent her since Sarah had cut Fen out of her will and left most of her money to charity. Pepper had been furious at having the burden of sorting through all of Sarah’s accumulated stuff – trash, she had called it – when she wasn’t even getting much of a legacy for her trouble.
‘It’s all right for you,’ Pepper had said crossly. ‘If Gran hadn’t moved nearer to us, I wouldn’t have got lumbered with all of this.’
‘Hunstanton isn’t near Lincoln,’ Fen said.
‘Mother thinks it is,’ Pepper said bitterly. ‘She told me I was the one who was closest and I should do the house clearance. And I can’t just throw it all away, Fen. You know what Gran was like. There might actually be something valuable in amongst all the rubbish.’
‘Well, God forbid you should miss that and give it to charity by accident,’ Fen had said and Pepper had put the phone down on her. Happy families, Fen thought. With a sigh, she put the salad bowl down carefully on the counter, wiped her hands down her jeans, and went through the arch into the living room.
She needed scissors to open the parcel. Pepper had sealed it up so thoroughly that there seemed no way in. She inserted the blade beneath the brown sticky tape and cut into the cardboard. She felt a whisper of something soft and light against the blade and stopped immediately, feeling a flash of some emotion that felt oddly like panic.
The lid of the box lifted away to reveal layers of tissue paper with a neat cut sliced through them. On top was a piece of thick, cream-colour writing paper, folded in half, covered with Sarah’s imperious handwriting. It felt very odd to see it now, her grandmother speaking to her from beyond the grave when she had barely spoken to her at all in the last twelve years of her life.
Fenella,
This is yours. Do with it what you think best but be aware of the danger.
The note was unsigned.
Fen’s heart started to race. She knew at once what ‘this’ was.
Carefully, and with hands that shook, she unfolded the rustling layers of tissue paper. A faint smell came from the box – lavender, conjuring up the memory of her grandmother’s garden in the summer, the sun on hot stone, and mothballs, a pungent smell she had always hated. Her fingers brushed something soft and smooth, silk, aged and pale yet still retaining the shimmer of gold.
A sensation shot through her, recognition and dread and a strange sort of excitement.
The golden gown came free of its wrappings with a whisper of sound that was like the past stirring. It felt as though it sighed, shivering in Fen’s hands. Unconsciously, she held it close to her heart in exactly the same way she had done in her bedroom fourteen years before.
She had had no idea that her grandmother had known about the golden gown. When she had left Swindon she had abandoned it in the bottom of her wardrobe underneath her sports kit and her hockey stick. It felt like something she had outgrown along with her childhood. She needed to leave it behind and move on.
She wondered if Sarah had found the gown when she had packed up to move back to her native Norfolk. It was odd that she had said nothing at the time, but then they had not really been on speaking terms.
Fen picked up her grandmother’s note again, frowning a little.
This is yours. Do with it what you think best but be aware of the danger.
What on earth had Sarah meant by that?
Fen knew all about danger. She had an intimate, atavistic relationship with it that raised the hairs on the back of her neck. The memory of terror stalked her. She only needed to close her eyes to see each episode unfurl like a film reel. She would be running, tripping in her haste to escape, her heart pounding. Then Jake would catch her. She could feel his grip on her arm, the wrench of her bones as he hauled her back against him and held her close.
‘I love you,’ he had kept repeating, as though that were a charm that warded off all evil. ‘I love you so much. I will always love you.’
She never wanted to hear those words again.
She gave a violent shudder and came back to the room and the bright sunshine and the golden gown. How could it be dangerous? It was just a piece of old silk and lace.
Pepper had not bothered to enclose a covering note so there was no explanation. Nor was there anything else from Sarah, no words of endearment, no mention of any regrets her grandmother might have had about their estrangement. The initial breach between them had never healed and when Fen had divorced Jake the year before, it had worsened.
‘You always were selfish,’ her grandmother had snapped. ‘That poor boy. After all he’s been through! He stood by you. He didn’t press charges when he could have done. How could you do this to him, Fenella?’
‘You don’t understand,’ Fen had said. ‘It wasn’t like that.’ She had repeated the words so often but no one was listening. No one wanted to hear. Sarah had always liked Jake. Everyone did.
‘Darling,’ Fen’s mother had said vaguely from a research conference in Tanzania, ‘you know what Sarah’s like. She’ll fall out with someone else in the family soon and you’ll be reinstated.’ But it had never happened. The estrangement had frozen into a permanent separation and now Sarah was dead and the only word from her was the gown and a warning. Fen felt the familiar mixture of misery and frustration possess her. She had loved Sarah. She had wanted them to be reconciled. This gesture only made her feel worse, and she wondered whether Sarah had done it deliberately to upset and challenge her.
Her phone rang and Fen reached automatically to answer it.
‘Hey.’ It was Jessie’s voice, warm, happy and all loved up. Fen felt a stirring of envy. Jessie and Dev were the proof that not all relationships were waking nightmares.
‘Hi,’ she said. ‘How was Paris? Did you have a good time?’
‘Lovely,’ Jessie said. ‘Crêpes and croissants in Montmartre, silhouettes down by the Seine, theatres, museums…’ She sounded dreamy. ‘What about you? How did it go in London?’
‘We missed you,’ Fen said truthfully, ‘but it was a nice evening.’ And I met your brother on the train home. She felt a pang of regret mingled with awkwardness. She had already decided not to tell Jessie about her encounter with Hamish. ‘Least said, soonest mended’ had been one of Sarah’s maxims, although in this particular instance, it was more a case of say nothing and hope for the best.
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