The Darkest Hour (60 page)

‘So, what have you got to be so tired about?’ Eddie retorted. ‘It’s not as though you have a baby to occupy you and that child will be going to nursery school soon.’

‘No, I have no baby to exhaust me!’ she yelled back at him. ‘And whose fault is that?’ Her eyes filled with tears.

‘Well, luckily I don’t have to look to you to give me a son. There are other women who are still capable of bearing my child!’ His sneer was delivered with vicious suddenness.

The silence that followed was electric. Evie sat down suddenly. ‘What do you mean?’ Her voice was dangerously quiet.

Eddie took a step backwards. ‘Never mind. Forget it.’

‘No. I won’t forget it. I am hardly likely to forget a statement like that,’ she said. ‘What did you mean?’

Eventually he told her. What was the point of denying it? Besides, he was proud of his son.

‘Lavinia Gresham,’ she echoed quietly. Of course, she had known it was still going on but she had chosen to ignore it.

Two days later she drove into Arundel and parked outside the woman’s house. There was a pram in the garden. She let herself in through the gate and went to peer inside it. The child was sleeping peacefully, tightly tucked in beneath a warm white blanket.

‘So, he told you.’ The voice behind her made her jump. She turned. Lavinia was standing on the doorstep, a cigarette in her hand.

‘Yes, he told me.’

‘I thought he would. I’m sorry. That was cruel of him, but then he is a cruel bastard, isn’t he?’ Lavinia leaned against the doorpost and took another puff from the cigarette.

Evie was trying to hold back her tears. ‘What is he called?’

‘Paul.’ Lavinia smiled. ‘Eddie hates the name.’

Evie gave a wry smile. ‘He would hate any name he hadn’t chosen himself.’

‘Do you want to come in? He’ll be all right there for a bit longer.’

The woman led the way back inside and put on the kettle as Evie sat down at the table in the front window. From there she could see the pram. A small pink fist was waving from the blankets. Lavinia put a cup down in front of her and glanced outside. ‘He’s woken up. He’ll be screaming blue murder in a minute. Do you want to go before I bring him in?’

Evie shook her head slowly. ‘Can I hold him?’

‘You really want to?’

Evie nodded. ‘Please. Just this once. Then I’ll go. I won’t bother you again.’

Lucy was sitting in her bedroom at the vicarage staring into space. What was she going to do now? She had no one to blame but herself for this débâcle with Mike. If all her research fell apart now what would she do? How could she bear not to know what happened next in Evie’s life? And how could she bear not to see Mike again?

She frowned. Where had that thought come from? How could she? How could she be so disloyal to Larry’s memory? She was chewing miserably on her thumbnail when she heard Huw and Maggie’s car turn in on the gravel below.

Five minutes later there was a quiet knock at the door. ‘Lucy?’ It was Maggie.

‘Come in,’ she said despondently.

Maggie opened the door and put her head round it. ‘Lucy, dear. Mike is with us. He wants to see the portrait.’

Lucy felt a shaft of panic run through her then she sighed. ‘Why not?’

‘It’s up to you.’ Maggie walked over and sat down on the bed beside her. ‘He phoned Huw. He is very confused and hurt, but I have a feeling if you can explain to him why you didn’t tell him he will understand.’

Lucy gave a grim smile. ‘I doubt it.’ Standing up, she pushed her hair back behind her ears. ‘Come on then. Will we need a screwdriver or something to open the crate?’

They walked down the landing and Maggie opened the door to the little chapel. She let out a small scream. ‘Oh my God!’

‘What is it?’ Lucy peered over her shoulder.

The crate appeared to have been chopped open with an axe. The painting was lying in front of the altar, the canvas ripped.

‘Oh, no!’ Lucy stood stock-still, aghast. At the sound of Maggie’s cry Huw raced up the stairs from the hall, followed closely by Mike.

Huw walked over to the picture and gently picked it up. ‘It’s the boy’s face. Ruined.’ He leaned it against the altar and squatted down in front of it.

Mike followed him and peered over his shoulder. ‘It’s a lovely portrait of Evie. She looks so young and happy.’

‘But Tony.’ Lucy said sadly. ‘Why is it always Tony he attacks?’

‘This wasn’t a ghost!’ Mike said firmly. ‘Don’t try and tell me that. Someone has been in here.’

Huw was thoughtful. ‘That is what we say each time this happens. But how did they get in? Where? The house was locked. We were here. Lucy was here.’ He glanced round at his wife helplessly. ‘Maggie, can you sense him? Can you sense anybody?’

Maggie had moved away from the others and was standing with her eyes closed, her hands held slightly in front of her as though she were testing the quality of the air. ‘I can sense immense anger. If it was a thief they would have taken the picture which, if what you all say is true, is worth a good bit of money. This person has attacked the young man in the picture and been careful not to touch Evie. How, using such force, could he have been so discriminating?’ She moved forward and gently ran her fingers over the tears in the painting. She shuddered. ‘It’s the same person, Huw, as at the gallery. I can almost see him. His fury and –’ she hesitated, ‘his jealousy are so strong. He is full of hatred.’

Lucy shuddered. ‘Who is he?’

‘It is Eddie Marston,’ Maggie said quietly.

There was a stunned silence. Mike stared at her. ‘What on earth makes you say that?’

‘Hannah recognised him from a picture in your mother’s dining room. She saw his ghost hovering near the paintings in their house in Midhurst.’

‘Hannah?’ Mike said quickly. ‘When did you see Hannah?’

‘This afternoon.’

‘Christopher came to see me this evening,’ Mike said. ‘Hannah is missing. They are frantic about her.’

Maggie frowned. ‘I understood they knew she was staying with your mother,’ she said slowly. She sighed. ‘I’ll go and ring Juliette now, just to check what is going on.’ She turned and left the room, leaving them standing in a semi-circle round the picture.

‘I thought it would be safe in here,’ Huw said, shaking his head. ‘My prayers were not strong enough. I am so sorry. I failed.’

‘It’s not your fault!’ Lucy cried. ‘I won’t hear of that. It is the fault of this malicious man; and mine for coming here. I shouldn’t have brought the picture here.’

‘If not here, Lucy, where else?’ Huw said sadly.

The room was silent for a moment. ‘My grandmother looks so very happy,’ Mike said at last. He cleared his throat. ‘You think this man was her lover?’

Lucy looked at him almost apologetically. Was there a resemblance there to the face which had been so viciously hacked about in the portrait? Without the photo she wasn’t sure. ‘Yes, I think he was. His name was Tony Anderson and he was stationed near Box Wood Farm. I don’t know where she met him, perhaps through her brother, Ralph. But it didn’t work out and later he was killed.’

‘And she married my grandfather on the rebound?’

Lucy nodded. ‘That’s what it looks like. She was devastated when Tony died.’

Mike gently touched the torn margins of the canvas. ‘Can this be repaired?’

‘I am sure it can. It is just such a shame. The face had been painted out when Larry bought the painting. He was cleaning the canvas when he realised that something had been over-painted.’ She looked at him pleadingly. ‘The painting wasn’t signed. It had no attribution in the auction. It has never been verified.’

‘I recognise her,’ Mike whispered.

She smiled sadly. ‘You knew her. We didn’t. Not then.’

‘But you guessed. Your husband obviously thought he recognised it,’ Mike said harshly.

She nodded again. ‘He did, yes. He hoped it was a Lucas. It was looking her up, and trying to find out about her that made me want to write about her. She is one of the great women war artists, but somehow she had slipped out of sight. I submitted a plan for the book and applied for a grant and the acceptance came after Larry died.’ There was a long pause. Lucy’s face had fallen into an expression of intense sadness.

Mike cleared his throat uncomfortably.

‘I still do not see why you chose to keep the fact that you had this picture from me.’

‘Maybe I suspected that you would react the way your cousin did. Suspicious and resentful and attributing all kinds of horrible motives to me,’ she snapped. ‘I wasn’t wrong, was I? That was exactly what happened. From the moment you knew it existed you suspected me of all that and more.’ She took a deep breath, but it was too late to stop now. ‘I am not planning to exploit Evie,’ she cried. ‘I want her recognised for her talent and her skill and her brilliance. I haven’t stolen the painting. We bought it legitimately. I have the receipt!’ For a moment she stared wildly from Mike to Huw, then for the second time, unable to confront him, she turned and ran out of the room.

Tony was still in Egypt when VE day came. Shortly afterwards he returned to Britain, leaving Port Said for Toulouse and then Dieppe. He stayed a few days in London before heading back to Scotland. While he was in London he went to the National Gallery and there he had stood for a long time in front of a painting entitled
The Madonna of the Blitz
. He found himself lost in the picture, feeling the desolation, the anguish and the love of the mother for her child. He stood there so long, lost in the sadness of his dreams that he did not at first feel the touch of the woman’s hand on his arm. He jumped, and looked at her, almost expecting it to be Evie. It wasn’t. It was a middle-aged woman in a black suit with a small black velvet hat with a half veil. Her face was pale and tired but very kind.

‘I saw the tears in your eyes,’ she said gently. ‘I am so sorry. You’ve lost someone you love.’

He nodded. What was the point in correcting her. After all, he had lost someone, and it was someone he had loved almost more than life itself. They walked together out into Trafalgar Square and strolled up the Strand to the Lyons Corner House where they had a cup of tea together. He never knew her name, or why she had been in the gallery. She too had lost someone, that was obvious, and for a couple of hours they kept one another company, then it was time for him to go.

He took the train north, heading back to his parents’ farm and from there he was to restart his law studies in Edinburgh, no longer a Squadron Leader, just a student lawyer once again.

He graduated three years later and joined the Faculty of Advocates as a rising star. If he thought about his times at Westhampnett, and his visit to the National Gallery in London he did not mention it to anyone, not even his parents. Why should he?

Mike left the vicarage without seeing Lucy again. Sadly he climbed into his car and headed back to Rosebank Cottage. He couldn’t get the image of the slashed face of the young pilot out of his head.

He was standing on the back lawn, staring up at the night sky when his phone rang suddenly. He groped for it in his pocket. ‘Lucy?’ He wasn’t sure why he had thought it would be her. Not after the way she had run out of the room. Whatever he said to her it seemed to be the wrong thing, but he hoped he was right and that she was trying to make up for her hasty disappearance. In the chapel they had waited for a while, then Huw had gently placed the painting facing the wall and the two of them had walked slowly downstairs to meet Maggie. Minutes later Mike had made an embarrassed exit from the vicarage.

He paused now, waiting for her to reply, but the moment of silence was followed by a harsh laugh.

‘No, sorry, not Lucy. It’s Charlotte. I need to talk to you.’

Rachel was waiting for Evie in the kitchen at the farm when she came in.

‘Hello, Mummy,’ She greeted her mother. She gave Johnny a gentle push so that he ran on, heading straight for the biscuit tin on the table. ‘What is it?’ She had seen Rachel’s face, which was pale and drawn. ‘How is Daddy?’

‘He is all right.’ Rachel took a deep breath. ‘I’m sorry, Evie, but I don’t know how long we can go on like this. Eddie has gone too far this time.’

Evie was taking off her hat. She threw it down on the sideboard and turned to her mother with a sigh. ‘What has he done now?’

‘He’s brought a baby.’ Rachel sat down abruptly and ran her fingers through the tight greying curls of her hair. ‘He says it is going to live here and that you have agreed.’

Evie stared at her ‘A baby?’

‘A child.’

For a moment, Evie was speechless for several seconds, then at last she said, ‘Where is he?’

‘He took it upstairs.’

‘Keep Johnny down here.’ Evie headed for the door, slamming it behind her before heading for the stairs.

‘Come in. Don’t say a word.’ Eddie looked up at her as she walked into the bedroom.

The baby was lying on the bed asleep.

Evie looked down at him. ‘That’s Paul, I take it.’ Her voice was harsh.

Eddie looked up. ‘George. He’s called George.’