Coming Home (67 page)

Rupert Rycroft, on his first morning, slept in. When he did wake, opened his eyes and stared blearily at the opposite wall, he found himself disorientated. There had been so much travelling, so many strange beds, in such a short space of time, and now, seeing the end of a brass bed, striped wallpaper, and thickly flowered curtains, half-drawn, he couldn't work out where the hell he was.

But only for an instant. Recollection flooded back. Cornwall. Nancherrow. He had finally got Athena home, having flogged the length of the country, and Rupert had driven the entire way. From time to time, Athena, half-heartedly, had offered to take the wheel, but Rupert preferred to be in charge of a situation, and his car was too precious to him to be trusted to the hands of another. Even Athena.

He fumbled a bare arm out from beneath the covers and reached for his watch. Ten o'clock. He lay back with a groan. Ten o'clock in the morning. Horrors. But the Colonel, seeing him to his room, had said, ‘Breakfast's at eight-thirty, but catch up on your sleep. We'll expect you when we see you,’ and some automatic trigger in Rupert's brain had done what it was told. Which was the same, in a converse sort of way, as knowing one had to be on parade at seven-thirty in the morning, however stunned with alcohol from the previous night's partying.

They had arrived at half past midnight, and only Athena's parents were there to greet them, the remainder of the house party having already retired to bed. Athena, who for most of the way had been quite alert and chatty, fell silent for the last hour or so of their journey, and Rupert knew that she was both longing for, and dreading, arrival. Longing to be there, safe in the bosom of her family, and dreading the news that she feared they were going to impart. It was such a private anxiety that Rupert knew he could not intrude, and so he said nothing and left her in peace.

But, at the end of the day, it turned out that everything was going to be all right: the old aunt who had been so ill was not, after all, going to expire. Rupert's gallant sacrifice of a week's grouse-shooting, and his marathon effort to get Athena back to her family, had been for nothing. Unnecessary. It took a bit of swallowing, but he kept his expression doggedly pleased.

Athena, however, was, quite naturally, ecstatic. She stood with her mother in the high, lighted hallway of Nancherrow, and hugged enormously, and their endearments and unfinished sentences and rejoicings sounded like a positive collision of emotions.

‘I can't believe it…’

‘Such a long way to come…’

‘…I was so afraid she was going to be dead…’

‘Oh, my darling…’

‘…we've driven all day…’

‘So tired…’

‘…she's really going to get better…?’

‘…hope so. Such a long way. Perhaps we shouldn't have told you…’

‘…I had to be here…’

‘…spoilt your holiday…’

‘…it doesn't matter…nothing matters…’

Rupert had already met Diana Carey-Lewis. She had been with Athena in the little town house in Cadogan Mews when Rupert arrived to bear Athena off to Scotland. He had thought then, and still thought, that they looked more like sisters than like mother and daughter. Tonight, at this late hour, Diana was, very sensibly, already wrapped in a floor-length dressing-gown of rose-pink wool, but the Colonel remained fully dressed. Over the heads of the two incoherently happy women, Rupert looked up to meet the eye of his host; saw the elderly velvet dinner-jacket and the silk bow-tie, and knew a comfortable familiarity. Like his own father, the Colonel clearly changed for dinner every evening. Now he came forward, with his hand outstretched.

‘Edgar Carey-Lewis. How enormously kind of you to bring Athena home to us. And now it must seem to you that all your efforts have been spent on an empty cause.’ And he was so apologetic and so sympathetic that Rupert put his own private chagrin behind him, and did his best to reassure the older man.

‘Don't think that, sir. It's a case of all's well that ends well.’

‘That's generous of you. Even so, something of a disappointment for you to lose out on your shooting.’ And then, disarmingly, and with perhaps an inappropriate spark of interest in his fading eyes, ‘Tell me, how were the grouse?’ he asked.

‘We had two great days.’

‘What sort of a bag?’

‘Over sixty brace. Some splendid coveys.’

‘Now, I suppose, you'll be keen to get back?’

Rupert shook his head. ‘Not worth it, sir. I was only offered a week.’

‘I'm sorry. We've spoilt everything.’

‘Don't think that.’

‘Well, you're more than welcome here. Stay as long as you like.’ He eyed Rupert approvingly. ‘I must say, you're taking it all very well. If I were you, I'd be chewing the rugs. Now, why don't I pour you a nightcap?’

Ten o'clock in the morning. Rupert climbed out of bed and went to draw back the curtains. He found himself looking down into a cobbled courtyard filled with the cooing of white fan-tailed doves; there were tubs of geraniums, and a line of starch-white washing blowing in the breeze. Beyond the courtyard were verges of grass, and in the middle distance a clump of trees, heavy with leaf. By leaning out of the window and craning his neck a bit, he was rewarded by the view of the blue horizon. All was washed in the clear sunshine of a perfect summer's morning, and he decided, philosophically, that if he could not be at Glenfreuchie slaying grouse, then this place was, quite certainly, the next-best thing. He withdrew from the window, yawned and stretched enormously. He was ravenously hungry. He headed for the bathroom and began to shave.

Downstairs was a bit disconcerting because there didn't seem to be anybody about. But by means of a bit of reconnoitring, Rupert found the dining-room, occupied by a tall and stately gentleman who was clearly the butler. Nettlebed. Athena had talked of Nettlebed.

He said, ‘Good morning.’

The butler turned from the sideboard, where he had been rearranging dishes on the hotplate.

‘Good morning, sir. Captain Rycroft, is it?’

‘That's right. And you're Nettlebed.’

‘I am, sir.’ Rupert advanced and they shook hands.

‘I'm desperately late.’

‘The Colonel said that he'd told you to sleep in, sir. But I'm sure you'd like something to eat…There's bacon and sausages here, and if you'd like a fried tomato, Mrs Nettlebed will be happy to oblige. And coffee. But if you'd prefer tea…?’

‘No, coffee's fine.’ Rupert looked at the table, the great long mahogany length of it with only a single place laid at one side. ‘I seem to be the last.’

‘There's only Athena to come, sir. And Mrs Carey-Lewis said not to expect her until luncheon.’

‘No. She'll need her sleep.’ He helped himself to the bacon and sausages, and Nettlebed poured his coffee.

‘You had a long journey, sir?’

‘Just about the length of the country. Tell me, where is everybody else?’

Nettlebed told him. ‘The Colonel and Mrs Carey-Lewis are up at The Dower House…they go every morning, to visit Mrs Boscawen and be certain that the nurse has everything under control. And Edward has driven Mary Millyway into Penzance to do some household shopping and pick up supplies for Mrs Nettlebed. And Loveday has taken Mr Callender off in search of some picturesque spot where he can do some sketching.’

‘Who's Mr Callender?’

‘Mr Gus Callender, sir. Edward's friend from Cambridge. Apparently, he is something of an amateur artist.’

‘And he's staying too? What a houseful you have to deal with. No wonder Edward has gone off in search of rations.’

‘Nothing out of the ordinary, sir,’ Nettlebed assured him modestly. ‘We're used to a full house, Mrs Nettlebed and I.’

‘So, when I have finished my breakfast, and until Athena puts in an appearance, what do you suggest I do with myself?’

Nettlebed allowed himself a smile, appreciating the young gentleman's assurance. ‘The morning papers are in the drawing-room, sir. Or, as it's such a pleasant morning, perhaps you would like to read them out of doors, in the sunshine. You'll find garden chairs outside the French windows. Or you may prefer to take a little exercise? A walk, perhaps…?’

‘No. I think the exercise can wait. I shall lie in the sun and scan the news.’

‘An excellent idea, sir.’

He took
The Times
from the drawing-room, carried it out of doors, but in the end did not read it. Instead, he settled himself in a long cane chair and gazed through narrowed eyes at the pleasing prospect of the garden. The sun was warm, and a bird was singing somewhere, and below him a gardener was mowing the tennis-court, drawing swaths of green behind him, ruler-straight. He wondered if, later on, he would be expected to play. And then stopped thinking about tennis, and instead, brooded over the question of Athena.

Thinking back, it was hard to work out just how he had landed himself in this dilemma, which had metamorphosed as he was least expecting it, and at a most inconvenient time. He was twenty-seven, a cavalry officer, a captain in the Royal Dragoon Guards, and a man who had always treasured and guarded his fairly wild bachelor existence. A new war was imminent and he would be in the thick of it, posted off to some God-forsaken spot, to be shelled, shot at, wounded, or possibly killed. Right now the last thing he needed was to get married.

Athena Carey-Lewis. He and a couple of his Regimental cronies had driven from Long Weedon to London for a party. A cold winter evening, a warmly lit first-floor drawing-room in Belgravia. And almost immediately, he had spied her across the room, and thought her sensationally beautiful. She was, of course, deep in conversation with an overweight and vacuous-looking man, and when he made some footling joke she laughed, smiling up into his eyes. And her smile was enchantment, and her nose just the wrong shape, and her eyes blue as very dark hyacinths. Rupert could scarcely wait to get his hands on her. Later, and not before time, their hostess introduced them. ‘Athena Carey-Lewis, darling. Surely you must have met before? No? Athena, Rupert Rycroft. Isn't he heaven? All leathery and sunburnt. And his glass is empty! Give it to me, and I'll get you a refill…’

After the party he dumped his cronies, and got her into his car, and they went to The Mirabelle and then The Bagatelle, and it was only because he had to be back in Northamptonshire and be on parade at seven-thirty in the morning that he finally took her home, dropping her at the door of a little house in Cadogan Mews.

‘Is it your house?’

‘No, it's my mother's.’

‘Is she there?’

‘No. Nobody's there. But you can't come in.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because I don't want you to come in. And because you've got to get back to Northamptonshire.’

‘Shall I see you again?’

‘I don't know.’

‘Can I phone you?’

‘If you want. We're the only Carey-Lewises in the book.’ She dropped a kiss on his cheek. ‘'Bye.’ And before he could stop her, or even accompany her, she was out of the car and across the cobbles, opening her front door, slipping inside, and closing it firmly behind her. He sat for a moment gazing at it, wondering, in a slightly tipsy fashion, whether he could have imagined the entire encounter. Then he sighed deeply, put his car into gear and roared noisily away, down the Mews and beneath the arch at its end. He only just made it back to Long Weedon in time for morning parade.

He telephoned, but there was never any answer. He wrote a letter, a postcard, but got no reply. Finally, on a Saturday morning, he presented himself at the front door of the little house, beat upon it with his fist, and when Athena opened it, wearing a silk dressing-gown and bare feet, he thrust a bunch of flowers at her and said, ‘Flee with me to Gloucestershire.’