A Dark and Distant Shore (85 page)

Vilia had said, ‘You are their hostess, remember, because this is your home. You are of an age now when you must begin to learn what responsibility means.’

Jermyn said, ‘Pay attention, Juliana, for goodness’ sake. I’m not explaining all this to you just for fun, you know!’

‘Well,
I
don’t want to know how to make nitro-whatever-it-is! Why should I?’

‘Girls! Always asking what things have to do with
them
!
Can’t you be interested in knowledge for its own sake?’

‘No.’

‘Well, you should be. Pay attention. What you do is mix concentrated nitric and sulphuric acid, like this...’

Juliana sighed. Vilia had said, ‘It would be considerate to allow Lizzie to have Lavinia all to herself, just for a while. You know how close they used to be, and how distressed Lizzie was to be separated from her. I know you have done a great deal to make Lizzie happy here. In fact, I am very pleased with you.’ Juliana had stared, and then turned pink. Commendation from her stepmother was something quite out of the common run. Not that Vilia was ever unkind, but she was inclined to be cool and sometimes impatient when Juliana employed the helpless feminine tricks that pleased her papa so much. ‘However, you mustn’t be too obvious about it. Lavinia would feel very unwelcome if you left her alone with Lizzie for no good reason. I suggest what you do is look after Jermyn. Peregrine James is really too young to be a companion to him. And then everyone will be happy.’ Except Peregrine James, Juliana had thought – but that was before she had met him. The youngest of the Lauristons was eminently capable of filling in his time without assistance from anyone. He was the most astonishingly self-contained and self-assured child.

‘Juliana!’

‘Yes, Jermyn.’

She didn’t understand him at all. His head was stuffed full of facts and figures and equations and what he called ‘formulae’. She wasn’t quite sure what formulae were except that they included a great many strings of forgettable letters and numbers of which the only one that stuck in her mind was H
2
O for water. Why couldn’t he just say ‘water’ and be done with it? He was preoccupied with chemistry at the moment, but thought he would soon move over to mechanical engineering. She didn’t know what that was, either, but he said he thought it would suit his cast of mind better. She was, however, perfectly able to recognize that he found the task of trying to explain things to her exceedingly wearisome and only did it out of courtesy, and because, too, the very act of explaining seemed to force him into asking questions of himself. More than once, he had stopped himself in the middle of a sentence to say thoughtfully, ‘Now, that’s a possibility, isn’t it!’ And because she had learned when she was quite small to open her eyes wide and look admiring whenever any grown-up male seemed to think he had done something clever, she had said, ‘Is it? How exciting!’ But from that point of view Jermyn wasn’t very satisfactory. She was used to a responsive smile, and a reassuring hug or pat on the shoulder, whereas all Jermyn did was look at her as if she wasn’t there.

Now he said, ‘Are you watching? Once it’s properly cooled, I’ll treat purified glycerine with it, and we’ll finish up with a heavy, oily-looking liquid.’ He began to lay out a variety of old saucepans and jars, and what looked like a porridge spurtle. ‘I have to stir it,’ he said, ‘and it’s very important to do it slowly and gently, otherwise it might blow up. I don’t suppose you know that stirring things is sometimes enough to generate its own heat?’

‘Blow up
?
’
she almost shrieked.

‘Oh, don’t worry, and stop capering around. It doesn’t like sudden vibrations, either.’

She had withdrawn a hurried few steps, but stopped dead. In a breathy little voice, she exclaimed, ‘You must be mad! Why are you playing about with it if it’s likely to blow up!’

Calmly measuring something from a thick glass flask, he replied, ‘Because it’s meant to, stupid. That’s what nitro-glycerine is. An Italian chemist called Sobrero discovered it two or three years ago. People have been looking for something to improve on gunpowder for ages and ages, and the most promising alternatives seem to be either this or gun cotton. But when Schönbein – that’s the man who discovered gun cotton – tried to make it commercially the year before last, he managed to blow up the whole works. It must have been quite a bang, because there were twenty-four people killed.’ He looked at Juliana, white as a sheet, and added kindly, ‘That was gun cotton – nitro-cellulose. Nitro-glycerine’s different, and it’s perfectly safe as long as you know what you’re doing.’

‘But why do you want to do it
at all
?
’

‘I should have thought it was obvious. With Lauristons’ so deeply involved in railway construction, it would be extremely advantageous to us if we could supply blasting explosive to prepare the tracks as well as the lines to lay on them! Now, be quiet for a moment, will you?’

She gulped, and watched as he carefully began stirring his mixture with the spurtle. At last, he said, ‘I’ll let it rest for a few moments now.’

‘But – but what are you going to do with it when you’ve finished making it?’

‘I’m going to take it up into the hills and see if I can blow up some rocks.’ He grinned suddenly. ‘Quite a long way into the hills! Grandmother would have a fit if she thought I was doing damage to her precious Kinveil, even if I’m only shifting a boulder or two. Don’t you dare tell her!’

Like all the Lauristons, he was a good-looking boy. Until now, Juliana had thought how attractive he was when he smiled; he had a kind of gentleness, even when he was being impatient with her, and she had felt comfortable with him. But not now. It was the horridly matter-of-fact way he talked about what he was doing, as if blowing up rocks – and people – was a perfectly commonplace affair. She would have felt far less frightened, and appreciably safer, if he had been breathless and keyed-up and wary. She stared at him saucer-eyed.

‘Just one more time,’ he said, thoughtfully, ‘and then I think we can leave it for a while.’ Gently, he stirred, and gently laid aside the spurtle. Then he turned and saw Juliana’s expression. ‘Poor Juley!’ he exclaimed with a chuckle. ‘You look frightened to death. Come along, then, and let’s forget about it. I could do with a cup of tea, couldn’t you? Do you think we might persuade them to make us some in the kitchen?’

He was very disarming, and she was so relieved she could have hugged him. As they emerged, hand in hand, from the laboratory, the fresh air coming up the staircase made her realize what nasty smells she had been breathing for the last hour. ‘Pooh!’ she said with a giggle. ‘We don’t want those disgusting smells spreading all over the place.’

And slammed the door.

Jermyn’s mouth was just opening when the bang came. It was the most terrifying experience of Juliana’s life, even counting that day when she had almost been drowned at the floating. It was the suddenness of it, and the loudness, and the way the floor shook, and plaster started raining down. It was the way the door she had just slammed groaned and creaked and then, slowly as in a nightmare, toppled out towards her and then jammed with a horrifying crash in the angle of the staircase. It was the nauseating, suffocating fumes that came with it. It was Jermyn pushing her and pulling her, his hands like steel claws on her arms, hurrying her downstairs and ignoring her screams and wails as she tripped and almost fell to her knees, and dragging her ruthlessly upright again. When they reached the courtyard, he released her abruptly, and with a crisp instruction to fetch Theo, vanished back into the doorway through which they had come. A greasy black cloud rolled sluggishly out of the gap.

But Juliana simply stood, weeping hysterically, far beyond common sense, as the courtyard filled with startled people. It was Theo she ran to and clung to, sobbing incoherently, and he had to take a moment to comfort her before he could make any sense of what she was saying through her hiccoughing gasps. Then, his fair brows lifting in a face profoundly unimpressed, he thrust the child into Vilia’s arms and himself plunged into the smoke. Sorley disappeared in his wake, and then three of the house servants. The others, on Vilia’s instructions, stayed where they were. ‘If help is needed,’ she said, ‘we will know soon enough.’

Magnus appeared just when Theo and the others had emerged again, coughing, spluttering and filthy. ‘Item,’ Theo was saying, ‘one hole in roof. Item, large crack in wall. Item, one splintered floor. Item, one coat of filthy grease over everything. Item, one tanning of Master Jermyn Lauristons hide. And by God, Jermyn, if you were a couple of years younger, I’d mean that literally! What were you playing at?’

Ghostly white under the dirt, Jermyn said, ‘It was an accident. Nobody’s fault.’

From the doorway of the Day Block, Magnus squawked, ‘Accident? Am I to understand you have blown the roof off Kinveil and you call it an accident?’ He was wearing a rather splendid embroidered dressing-gown, and his eyes were blurred, as if he had been woken violently from his afternoon nap.

Almost without thinking, Vilia began to soothe him, leading him back to his room with assurances that the damage was only superficial and best left to Theo to deal with. But when he showed a disposition to lay down the law, she handed him briskly over to his valet and returned to the fray.

It was three hours before a semblance of calm returned to Kinveil, and Vilia and Theo could retreat to chairs set up on the sea wall, where they would have ample warning of interruption, and lie back soaking in the evening peace. Theo had the decanter within easy reach, and Vilia, breaking her usual custom, held a glass containing not white wine but a stiff, neat, pale whisky. Gratefully, she murmured, ‘What a relief? Thank heaven Lavinia and Lizzie were out of the way at the time. Two more neurotic children would have been quite beyond bearing.’ Jermyn, extremely crestfallen, had been banished to his room with Peregrine James who had, at one point, been so supercilious as almost to earn himself a box on the ear from his exasperated grandmother. A returned Lavinia and Lizzie, after hovering inquisitively and getting under everyone’s feet, had been similarly dispatched, this time to the schoolroom. Magnus had retired to his bed to recover from the shock, and Juliana, her tears dried at last, had been tucked up with a cup of hot milk laced with honey. Sorley, with assistance, was clearing up the mess.

‘Oh, dear!’ Vilia sighed. ‘Other catastrophes apart, I suppose this afternoon’s episode has put an end to any hope of Juliana and Jermyn developing an attachment for each other. With Juliana shaking at the very sight of Jermyn, and Jermyn nobly taking the blame for something that was very clearly her fault – though I can’t think how! – it looks as if my plans have been as mortally injured as the roof. My poor castle. My
poor
castle!’

Lazily, Theo said, ‘Modern times, my dear. Once it was enemy slingshot, then Redcoat guns, now nitro-glycerine. Only another episode in history, another of Kinveil’s honourable scars. Does it really upset you so much?’

‘Yes, it does. Every stone in the place means something to me. I remember the corner I used to run to, when I was unhappy as a child. I remember which part of which wall I used to lean against, to pull off my boots before I went indoors. I remember which step I always rested on to get my breath back, when I was climbing to the top of the tower. I remember Jessie Graham sending me up to that very room Jermyn’s just blown the roof off, to look out and see whether the salt-smuggler was on his way up from Inverbeg. I remember the torrent that used to come in through that same roof when the snow melted. And I remember who had it mended. Mungo Telfer.’ There wasn’t any humour in her laugh. ‘Sentiment, I suppose. Oh, well. So much for Juliana marrying into the Lauriston family! It was as much as I could do to prevent Magnus from sending Jermyn packing, here and now. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him so angry. Do you think Peregrine James would do instead?’ She sighed. ‘I can’t see it, I must admit.’

Theo smiled. ‘No. On the other hand, my own hardened bachelor heart was touched when Juliana ran to me today. Perhaps I might marry her myself in a few years.’

After a long moment, Vilia withdrew her eyes from his face and gazed out towards Skye, an indigo silhouette against the pale green evening heavens. There was a sliver of new moon beginning to show. What age was he? Thirty-five? And Juliana a dainty, immature twelve, straight and undeveloped as a boy. But in another five or six years the chasm would be much narrower. It wouldn’t be a man and a child any longer, but two adults. There was nothing at all unusual in a girl marrying someone much older, and it was true that Juliana was very ready to turn to Theo for coaxing and reassurance. The idea hadn’t occurred to Vilia before, but it would be a perfect – a splendid solution to all her designs.
Such
a splendid solution. She said without inflexion, ‘Do you mean that?’

‘You tell me often enough that it’s time I was married. And if I must, then why not Juliana? You wouldn’t have any objection, would you? And we’re not blood relations, so the church could have none. Magnus could be persuaded, I imagine. All we have to do is convince Juliana herself. Perhaps you could handle that aspect of the matter?’

He was still smiling. Her eyes blind and her mind whirling, she smiled back at him. To persuade the child to see Theo as her surest – her only – refuge. To discourage her from running to anyone else. Magnus’s approval was important. If it were possible to set him at odds with everyone who presented a challenge to Theo – not only as husband but as trustee of the estate – it might all work out.

‘Perhaps I could,’ she said.

As the royal carriages drew up at the main entrance to the Crystal Palace at noon on the first of May 1851, the sky cleared and the sun came out in full force, setting the raindrops sparkling on almost three hundred thousand panes of glass so that, against all the odds, the place really did look as if it had been made from crystal. Gideon, sliding unobtrusively indoors through one of the less distinguished entrances, grinned to himself. It appealed to him that the world’s first great international exhibition of industry should be housed in a building that had been designed by a former gardener – on the model of the Duke of Devonshire’s lily house, no less – and nicknamed ‘crystal palace’ by some humorist on
Punch.
He wondered if Her Majesty had been amused. Probably not.