Fragile Mask (11 page)

‘
Oh, nothing very serious,’ said Adam stoutly. ‘At least, I
promise you I gave as good as I got.’

‘
But he is so
strong
, Adam. I am
sure you must have taken the worst of it.’

‘
Don’t you fret, Mama. I can stand a knock or two better
than you ever could.’

Mrs Peverill’s hand went to her mouth in a little gesture
of distress, and Adam, suddenly conscious of his own words,
coloured up.

‘
Beg your pardon, Mama. I didn’t mean to mention that, I
swear.’

Verena found herself angry all at once, the fog induced by
the double shocks of the morning receding fast.

‘
Why in the world shouldn’t you mention it? If there is to
be any further evidence of quite unnecessary secrecy in this room,
I give you my word I shall scream.’

Mrs Peverill promptly dissolved into tears, and Adam
flushed the more. But he was quick to jump to his mother’s
defence.

‘
For shame, Verena. Has not Mama explained? Has she not
begged your understanding? If this is the way you mean to go on, I
am not surprised she kept the matter from you.’

Verena rose swiftly, moving away from them both to stand
before the fireplace, gripping the mantel with both hands. Behind
her, she heard Mama hushing at Adam, as if she might prevent him
from provoking his sister further.

And why should she not feel provoked? Had she not reason
enough? No wonder Mama had been so much on edge of late, saying
repeatedly that Nathaniel must inevitably come to remove her from
Verena’s care. Of course he might come, since she had put the means
for him to do so into her son’s hands. It was not that she did not
trust Adam’s fidelity. Of course he would not dream of a deliberate
betrayal. But he had far less control than she—a lack which had
earned him many a beating that she had escaped—and she would not
put it past him to alert his father inadvertently to Mama’s
whereabouts.

Controlling her annoyance with an effort, she turned to
face them both. ‘I do understand, Mama.’

‘
Do you indeed, dearest?’ uttered Mrs Peverill in
piteous tones. ‘I
would
have told you, only I so much feared
to distress you, and your burdens are heavy enough. But I found I
could not endure to be without my boy—’ reaching out to clasp her
son’s hand between both her own as her voice trembled on the once
again threatening tears ‘—without even a word from him, let alone
never to have a sight of him.’

Verena sighed. ‘Could you not have spoken of it to me,
Mama? Have I been so unfeeling towards you that you could not find
it in you to confide in me?’

She regretted the hurt in her tone, but she could not help
it. As she might have expected, it had the effect of making her
mother’s tears flow all the faster.

‘
Dearest, it is not that, indeed it is not.’

It was Adam who put his finger on the nub of the matter.
‘Verena, you ought to know how hard it is for Mama to speak out—on
any matter. Her feelings have been so crushed.’

Yes, that was true enough. It must have been hard indeed
for her to dare to speak of something which she knew must meet with
disapproval. But Verena was uncomfortable with the thought that
Mama should think of her as an authority to whom she must
kowtow.

‘
Forgive me, Mama,’ she said, moving to sit beside Mrs
Peverill once again. ‘I had no intention of reproaching
you.’

‘
Oh no, Verena,’ protested her mother. ‘You have every right
to be angry. I know it was foolish of me, but—’

‘
Let us say no more about it. Adam is here now, and we
should rather enjoy his unexpected presence. For how long do you
mean to remain, Adam?’

It appeared that her brother could only be here a few days,
for he had informed his father that he was going on a visit to an
old school friend in order to exchange Christmas greetings. They
settled it that he should take a room at the New Inn close by, but
spend his days with them, Mrs Peverill extracting his promise to
remain at least until Friday when she might show him off at the
Lower Rooms.

Over breakfast, of which Adam partook, he was persuaded by
Mrs Peverill to give an account of what had transpired after their
removal.

‘
I’m afraid we continued fighting until the two of us were
incapable of anything further. We had drawn the entire domestic
staff out upon us by then. None of them dared to interfere, but at
the last Papa demanded his valet and they staggered away
together.’

‘
Did he not say anything—about us, I mean?’ asked
Verena.

‘
Not a word. So I did not either. The servants were left to
make what they might of the whole incident. You had set it about
that Mama was gone to the seaside for her health, Verena, but I
don’t think they long believed that. Not after the way Papa was
carrying on.’

Mrs Peverill’s eyes widened. ‘Carrying on? What do you
mean, dearest?’

‘
Was he drinking?’ asked Verena.

Adam nodded. ‘Heavily, I’m afraid. That was after he rushed
around searching for you. I found out from the grooms where he
went—all over the south coast, I think. For some obscure reason, he
seemed to be convinced that you must be in Little Hampton,
Mama.’

‘
Little Hampton!’ repeated Mrs Peverill on an odd
note.

‘
Yes, is it not the strangest thing?’

But Verena thought Mama looked a little conscious. What
could there be in that name to bring such a reaction? A moment
later she had forgotten it, however, for as her brother resumed, a
more horrible possibility reared its head.

‘
Has he been very miserable?’ asked Mrs Peverill.

Adam laid down the cup from which he had been sipping
chocolate, and looked at her.

‘
Mama, he is a changed man.’

She clasped her hands together, resting her fingertips
against her lips.

‘
Tell me.’

Her son shrugged. ‘I don’t quite know how to describe him.
He has gone quiet—despairing almost, as if the life has gone out of
him. He is drinking, yes, but he remains quite sober. I believe—’
He paused, glancing at his sister’s face.

Verena placed her knife and fork to one side of her empty
plate. ‘Say what you wish to, Adam. I had rather you did so in my
presence than that you saved it for Mama’s private ear so that she
felt obliged to keep it from me.’

‘
Don’t say that, my love. There will be no more
secrets between us, I promise you. Come, Adam. Verena will hear it
with patience, and I
must
hear it. What do
you believe?’

Adam drew a breath. ‘That he is missing you dreadfully,
Mama. If you could but see him. He has lost flesh, his eyes are
constantly shadowed—I suspect he is not sleeping. He—he mutters
over his glass. We do not converse, you see, apart from what must
be said. He has not forgiven me, that is sure. But what I truly
think, Mama, is that he cannot now forgive himself. He has had a
salutary lesson, which he will not readily forget.’

‘
No, for he will not be permitted to forget it,’ stated
Verena in a hard voice, seeing the evidence in Mama’s eyes of her
tender heart melting already. ‘It is a lesson he will remain at,
though he rue the day lifelong.’

Adam’s gaze came around to her, and he frowned in
perplexity. ‘I have never heard you speak so harshly, Verena. I
know you hate him, but have you no compassion?’

‘
None at all,’ returned Verena, adding on a bitter note,
‘and I wonder at it that you can have any either.’

Mrs Peverill intervened. ‘But I have, Verena. I do not like
to imagine him in such a state as Adam describes. Perhaps I should
think of going back.’

‘
Going back!’

Verena’s heart sank. This was just what she
feared. To have Nathaniel insinuate himself back into Mama’s
heart—in spite of all. Oh, she could scream with frustration. Now
she must use all her arts to persuade Mama against so ruinous a
course. She must speak to Adam in private. He
must
stop
painting this pitiful picture—a picture that only served to harden
her own heart. If Nathaniel was suffering and remorseful, so much
the better.

It was some little time before she could find a moment to
get Adam to herself, but at last Mrs Peverill’s tiredness overcame
her and Verena called out for Betsey to take her up to her bed to
sleep for a while.

There was silence for a short time after the two elder
females left the room. Adam, his slim fingers playing a fidgety
rhythm on his thigh as he moved restlessly about the parlour, cast
his sister an uneasy glance where she stood at the door she had
closed behind Mama.

Verena turned to look at
him.

‘
Oh, Adam,’ she sighed, and crossed the room to embrace him,
resting her head on his shoulder. ‘I’m so glad you’re
here.’

The young man hugged her close, and then took her shoulders
and drew her back a little so that he might look into her face.
Verena was above average height, but Adam, for all his slight
build, had a little the advantage of her. His features were of a
more severe cast than his age warranted, already set with lines
edging shadows under his eyes—an effect accentuated by the
hereditary overhang of his brow that gave to both his father’s orbs
and his own a hooded appearance. In Nathaniel, it was almost
sinister. In Adam, Verena found it touching for the loss of the boy
he should still have been.

‘
I’ve missed you,’ he said.

Verena’s eyes misted at the sorrow in his own. She reached
up and took his thin cheeks between both her own.

‘
Darling Adam.’

He clasped the hands and held them tight, bringing them
down to hold at his chest. ‘How are you managing?’

She lifted her shoulders in a little shrug and smiled.
‘Well enough.’

‘
No, I mean, here—this place.’ His glance travelled about
the parlour in a disparaging way. ‘You can’t mean to live like this
forever.’

Verena withdrew her hands, reserve entering her voice. ‘It
may not be what we are used to, but it is what we can afford on my
grandpapa’s money.’

Adam frowned. ‘Papa ought to make you an
allowance.’

‘
For that he must needs know where we are, Adam, and that he
must not.’ She grimaced. ‘It must be hell for you, alone with
him.’

Her brother shrugged. ‘He doesn’t notice me. He never
did.’

‘
Except when you would try to save Mama.’

‘
I couldn’t stand for it. I know Mama hated me to intervene,
but—’

‘
I know, Adam.’ Verena drew a breath. Now was her
opportunity. She must make him see reason, that he would cease to
speak to Mama of a return. ‘And you must also know that nothing has
changed.’

‘
Yes, but—’

‘
Adam! He may be as remorseful as you please. I have seen
him so before this, many times. I have heard him make his promises
to Mama, promises made with tears streaming down his face. But did
that prevent him, the very next time he chose to suppose himself
jealously injured by some imaginary slight, from raising his hand
to her again? You know it did not.’

‘
But that was in the past,’ her brother protested, releasing
her fingers and pacing away. ‘That was before he knew I might
retaliate on her behalf. If she returned—’

‘
She will never return!’

‘
But if she did, Verena, I swear I would never permit him to
touch her.’

‘
How could you prevent him?’ demanded his sister, moving to
stand in his path, forcing him to face her. It was evident that he
missed them both, that he wanted Mama home. But he must be made to
see how impossible it was. ‘How, Adam? Oh, I believe you are
sincere, my dear, but think a little. Could you be with her day and
night, guard her incessantly?’

‘
You are,’ he countered. ‘I dare say there is scarce a
moment when you are not together.’

‘
But we are living in lodgings. Besides, I am a female.
What, will you stand sentry by her bed, preventing his entry
there?’

‘
Verena!’ he gasped, shocked.

‘
Let us have no mealy-mouthed pretences about this, Adam.
You know as well as I that it is precisely in those
circumstances—in her very bed—that these hideous beatings begin.
That is just how he managed to conceal the matter from so many
eyes—even ours, Adam—for so long. Come, how old were you when you
knew of it first? How old was I?’

‘
Nine, ten—I don’t know,’ he uttered, his voice ragged with
distress.

‘
Well, I know,’ Verena told him with deliberation. ‘I was
eight years old before I knew why my mother was so often
indisposed. Why we were kept from her presence for so many days
together, why everyone was excluded—except Betsey.’

Adam shifted away, moving to stand before the big bay
window, looking out with unseeing eyes. She knew why. He could
never bear to speak of these matters, even when she had tried to
discuss them with him at home.