A Dark and Distant Shore (20 page)

He looked up. ‘Have you a moment to talk?’

His expression was perfectly neutral, but she was assailed by a sudden sense of danger. ‘Of course,’ she said, and then added, as if it were some kind of protection, ‘though if I am away for very long the Mackie girl will certainly knit up little Grace’s shawl quite wrongly. She has no more idea of pattern than a speck of dust in a storm.’ She smiled nervously.

‘Always busy. You should rest sometimes, Charlotte. You do too much.’

It was a familiar comment, and she bridled. ‘I should like to know how you imagine this household would go on if I didn’t supervise everything! If I...’

Her husband stopped her, raising his hand in a weary gesture of surrender. ‘Please, Charlotte! I apologize. I spoke out of turn. It’s just that I see so little of you.’

The tone was matter-of-fact, but the words soothed her a little. She said, ‘Of course I have time to talk. What is it about?’

He didn’t reply at once. There was a violent rattle of rain against the windows, as if some errant gust had scooped up a shovelful of pebbles and tossed them against the glass. Half startled, Charlotte turned her head. There was a pied wagtail marching oblivious about the lawn in his black-and-white livery, self-important as some civic dignitary at a banquet. Charlotte had always thought that a Highland raindrop must fall on a bird with much the same impact as a brick falling on a human being, but the wagtail didn’t even notice.

Perry said, ‘I think
I must go to London.’

Charlotte’s head snapped round. Regardless of sense or logic, London meant nothing to her nowadays but Vilia Cameron. ‘May I ask why?’

‘My investments, if such they can be called. You must know how Napoleon’s escape from Elba has thrown the markets into a state of flux. Shares are going down, and everyone is dreading the prospect of Europe being plunged into war again. You also know that the only capital I possess is invested in government funds. Well, my man of business wants me to sell.’

‘Surely he can deal with it? What is the purpose of having a man of business if he can’t? Why should you have to make the journey?’

His expression was strained. ‘I don’t know whether I can make you see how I feel. If I sell now, it must be at a loss, and God knows I’m near enough a pauper already. I have to discover whether his fears are well grounded, and at this distance I can’t weigh the risk for myself.’ He turned away restlessly. ‘Somehow, through thick and thin, I have managed to hold on to those shares, and I
will
not give them up without being absolutely convinced of the necessity. The choice is between selling them now, at a loss, and holding on in the hope that the market recovers.’

‘A gamble, in fact?’

It was unkind. His jaw tightened, but all he said was, ‘Of course. If I hold on and Napoleon plunges us back into war, I may lose everything. But if he doesn’t – if Wellington, say, meets him in battle and defeats him fully and finally – I might even make a modest profit.’

‘Then why not hold on? Even if you lose, it would scarcely be a major disaster. The interest can’t be much, and I am sure we could manage perfectly well without it.’ She had meant to be reassuring, but as soon as the words were out she knew that, somehow, she had made a calamitous mistake.

He drew a ragged breath. ‘Oh, certainly!
We
can manage without it. But I’m not sure whether
I
can.’

She didn’t understand. Floundering, she said, ‘But you have very few needs! Glenbraddan would be in a sorry way if it couldn’t contrive to pay your tailor and your gunsmith. Especially when you do so much to help the estate run smoothly.’

He sank down into one of the gilt and ormolu chairs and buried his face in his hands. It gave his voice a hollow sound when he said, after a few moments, ‘I deserve my wages, you mean?’

It was, she supposed, precisely what she had meant.

She could only just hear him as he went on, ‘How can I explain? It’s foolish, of course, but I don’t enjoy being beholden to you. While I have some money of my own, however little, I am still my own man. If I lose it, I lose my self-respect as well.’

‘But why? I don’t see
why!
All I have is yours as much as mine, and not only because the law says so.’ She hesitated, torn between her wish to give him everything he desired, and resentment at the discovery that he didn’t want her to. Her voice grated a little. ‘I want you to have it because I love you.’

It was out, for the very first time, the truth she had never before put into words. And he didn’t even notice.

As if she had not spoken, he sat back in his chair and said, ‘Don’t think I have anything against earning a wage, my dear. But if my accounts were to be set against those of the estate, I think young Edward and I would find ourselves in agreement for the first time in our acquaintance. Make no mistake about it, Charlotte, I don’t earn my keep. The estate would go on just as well without me, better, perhaps. There’s nothing for me to do except suggest ideas for your grieve to turn down.’

‘That’s unfair!’ On several occasions during the last three years Perry had proposed ways of making Glenbraddan more efficient and more productive, but the grieve, James Osgood, was naturally conservative and had always succeeded in finding sound reasons for saying no. Charlotte hadn’t thought Perry had been very much concerned. She said earnestly, ‘Glenbraddan is Edward’s, and until he comes of age I have no
choice
but to follow the advice of someone who is properly qualified. You know very well it would be wrong of me to listen to you rather than Osgood!’

‘Perhaps.’ He shrugged. ‘But I spend my days going from here to there, and back again, smiling and chatting like some royal consort, and everyone defers to me, and everyone knows what a sham it all is.’

She found that, hurt and defensive though she was, she couldn’t bear the bleak finality in his voice, as if there were no more to be said, ever. It had sounded like an epitaph. Through the ache in her throat, she said, ‘It needn’t be a sham! If I had only known... I am
sure
we can find something useful for you to do, if you really want it!’ But all she was doing was making things worse.

His mouth curved into a humourless half smile. He had a beautiful mouth, crisply muscled at the corners, with a long, spare, well-shaped upper lip, and a lower lip that was a little fuller but still straight and firmly chiselled.

Drearily she struggled on, self-pitying tears beginning to well under her eyelids. ‘I thought this was the kind of life you wanted, without care or responsibility. Without anyone making demands on you. I thought you were settled. I thought’ – it came out almost as a wail – ‘I thought we were happy!’

The grey eyes widened. ‘Did you, Charlotte?’

As always when she found something too difficult for her, her mind recoiled from it and took refuge in the easy safety of platitude. If, indeed, there was doubt about whether they were happy or not, there was only one explanation she was prepared to confront, the explanation in which, perversely, she had found a kind of comfort over the last months. ‘It’s that girl, isn’t it! You don’t love me, you never have. It’s Vilia Cameron you want!’

Her eyes were too full of tears to see the blank astonishment on his face or the exhaustion that followed it. Nor had she any idea of how she looked herself, her neat features disfigured by misery and spite. ‘Don’t trouble to deny it! Every soul in the Northern Meeting rooms last October saw the look on your faces when you were dancing together. She’s why you want to go to London! It has nothing to do with all that nonsense about the Funds, that’s only an excuse. I’m too old for you, and too commonplace, and too – too stupid! You think you can go to London, and make love to her, and...’ Her voice broke completely.

He rose, his face drawn and his movements oddly graceless, and laid his hands on her shoulders. He said, ‘Charlotte, don’t – please don’t – upset yourself so. You are quite wrong. I meant just what I said. I want to go to London on business that is of the greatest importance to me, whether you understand it or not. That is my only purpose, and I’ll come back to you as soon as it’s settled, richer or’ – a gleam of tired self-derision lit his eyes for a moment – ‘or poorer. Forgive me, but this is something that matters to me very deeply.’ She wouldn’t meet his eyes, and after a moment he released her and stepped back. ‘As for Mrs Lauriston, I think it most unlikely that I will even see her except by the purest accident. You’re quite wrong about that, you know.’

She was past the stage of listening. Nothing less than an impassioned embrace would have lightened her misery, and Perry, hopelessly honest – except sometimes with himself – neither could nor would resort to it.

‘I don’t believe you,’ she choked. ‘I believe you’ll come back. Oh, yes. You can’t afford not to. But if you go, I’ll know you’ve gone to her and I won’t
have
you back! Do you hear me?
I will not have you back.
’
Even as she said it, she knew deep down that she was killing any feeling he might ever have had for her, but she couldn’t help it. Furiously, she dashed a hand across her streaming eyes, and then fumbled for a handkerchief. She couldn’t find one, and it seemed like the last dismal, degrading, unbearable straw. Turning, she blundered from the room.

A Chinese vase rocked slightly as the door, flung back, glanced against the table on which it stood, but Perry didn’t even notice. He remained where he was, motionless and absorbed, for several minutes, and then at last addressed the empty air. ‘But I am going, just the same,’ he said softly. ‘Tomorrow.’

‘But I am going tomorrow,’ Andrew Lauriston complained sulkily. Vilia, drawing on her gloves, smiled at him. ‘And will be so deeply occupied for the whole of today that you won’t even notice my absence.’

It was true enough, but he would have preferred her to stay at home, just in case. Anyway, it wasn’t right that she should be setting off to enjoy herself at Ascot when he had just received orders to leave at first light tomorrow, with dispatches for Wellington at Brussels.

He said again, for the fifth time in as many minutes, ‘I still don’t understand why you are so determined.’

‘Because it’s Thursday the eighth of June, my dear! Gold Cup day! And I have been
so
looking forward to it.’ She was dressed as charmingly as always, in a habit of grey-green levantine, with her blonde hair coiled away under a matching, softly draped turban affair, worn rakishly to one side and ornamented with a prince’s plume. He knew that when she came back that evening after a round journey of sixty miles, she would look as perfectly groomed as she did now. ‘Just think,’ she went on. ‘This will be my first visit to Ascot since my father took me there when I was eleven, the very year the Gold Cup was first run.’

She could see that the idea didn’t excite him, and the sparkle died from her eyes. ‘In any case,’ she added, with a final look in the glass, ‘it would be most impolite to cry off at this late hour, when my host’s carriage is almost at the door.’

‘It’s only the Telfers,’ he objected.

‘
Only
the Telfers? You mean courtesy doesn’t matter with people one knows well?’ She cocked her elegant head at the sound of a carriage. ‘That must be them now. Never fear, I will be home by eight at latest, so that we can have a quiet supper together.’ She surveyed his discontented face ruefully. ‘Be honest, my dear. You will be busy till then, whatever happens!’

He wouldn’t admit it, so she kissed him lightly on the cheek and, with a shrug and another smile, went swiftly from the room.

The barouche was brand new and quite magnificent. As Magnus handed her up to join Lucy, Vilia said in a rallying tone, ‘Fine as fivepence! Now I see why you have broken your rule about attending race meetings. Nothing less than the Gold Cup would do for such a splendid turnout!’

Magnus had very little sense of humour, and none at all of the ridiculous. ‘I’m glad you think so,’ he said. ‘It seemed to me that today’s journey is just what is needed to loosen up the springs. We’ll change horses at Staines, of course. I’ve sent a team of rather nice blacks ahead to wait for us.’

She smothered a smile. The carriage was a beautiful bright yellow, picked out in black, and the mountings and trappings were of brass. Black horses were the obvious choice, but in her own view the four nicely matched, dappled greys already harnessed to it were much more subtle. ‘How splendid!’ she said dutifully.

To Lucy, whom she had not seen for several weeks, she remarked severely, ‘And how is this, Mrs Telfer? I was never more shocked in my life than to hear that you were proposing to expose yourself to the view of the scaff and raff on Ascot Heath. You must be all about in your head!’

Lucy was sufficiently well acquainted with Vilia to know when she was quizzing her, but her answering smile was tinged with apprehension. Casting a hasty glance at her husband – occupied in giving the coachman directions about a route which that worthy knew a good deal better than his master – she whispered, ‘Pray, my dear, do put a guard on your tongue today. Magnus is really not himself at all, quite fretful. Such doings at Glenbraddan, I cannot tell you. Well, I can, but not at this precise moment. Later, perhaps. Hush, now!’ Turning, she smiled at Magnus in an apologetic way that made Vilia long to shake her.

One hour and ten miles later, Magnus was in a fidget. They were no further than Hounslow, and while the horses were being watered he stood with his watch in his hand and his toe tapping, muttering, ‘One o’clock when the royal party reaches the course! I should not like to be late for that, you know!’

Lucy said, ‘But my dear, we have only another twenty miles to go, and almost three hours still. Surely there can’t be any doubt that we will arrive in time?’

‘No doubt?’ replied her spouse with something approaching a snort. ‘Just wait until we are within reach of Windsor. There will be dozens –
hundreds
of vehicles of all kinds. Tilburies, carts, gigs, chaises, one-horse wagons with upwards of eight or nine people in them. Mark my words, there will be more traffic between Windsor and Ascot than you have ever seen in London, my dear!’