The Emerald Comb (33 page)

In the end it was after nine pm before I heard his key in the door. I rushed out to the hallway to greet him, searching his face for clues as to how the day had been.

He was flushed and grinning from ear to ear. I looked around quickly to check the whereabouts of the kids – I’d already put Thomas to bed and the other two were ensconced in their respective bedrooms.

‘Come into the kitchen,’ I said. ‘I’ll make us a cup of tea and you can tell me all about it.’

He followed me through and sat down, still grinning. I filled the kettle and stopped myself from telling him to get on with it, let me know what happened. He’d need to tell me the story of the day in his own way, in his own time.

As I poured the tea he leaned back in his chair, put his hands behind his head and said, ‘She’s a cracker. Beautiful, lively, lovely girl. I’m so proud to be her dad.’

I smiled, and handed him the tea. ‘It went well, then?’

‘Brilliant. We got on so well. I think we’ve got quite a lot in common. She even played rugby for her college team.’

‘Well, she’s your daughter, you’re bound to have a lot in common.’ I felt an inexplicable pang of jealousy. He’d never talked in this way about Lauren. Or the boys.

‘Yes, but it was more than that. We just clicked. She was nervous at the start, like I was, but after about five minutes we were chatting like we’d known each other for years. Except of course we knew nothing about each other, and so there was a lot to fill in.’

‘Did she like the necklace?’

He nodded. ‘At least, she said she did but I think it’s probably not quite her style.’

I’d suggested it. Clearly got it wrong, then. ‘It was the thought that counted.’

‘Katie, she wants to come and visit us here. Meet you, and get to know her brothers and sister.’

‘We’ll have to tell them, then.’

‘Yes. She wants to come in a couple of weeks’ time, if that suits us. On a Saturday, for lunch, perhaps. I’ll help cook.’

Yeah right, I thought. Cooking wasn’t Simon’s strong point.

‘So we’d better tell the children soon, to give them time to get used to the idea of having a big sister before they meet her.’

‘Yep.’ He reached across the table and took my hand. ‘I’ll need your help with that, love. I’ve no idea how best to tell them.’

‘Of course I’ll help. It has to be both of us to tell them.’ I felt tears welling up in my eyes.

‘Thanks, love. You’ve been so great about all this.’

I shrugged. How else could I be over it?

Chapter Twenty-Three: Hampshire, December 1876

My dear Barty

This sorry narrative is almost at an end now. It remains only for me to bring you up to date, from those shameful events of 1841 to the present day. I shall do so briefly, for the main part of the story is now told, and there are thankfully no more shocks in store for you.

Agnes, as I have related, was readily accepted by the North Kingsley folk as Mrs St Clair. We were lucky in that no one of note in Winchester had known Georgia, so we were able to cautiously widen our social circles to that city. Agnes played her part well. She refined her speech and bearing, dressed herself immaculately – though never employed a lady’s maid to help her – and learned to converse on any topic with anybody.

The only thing expected of a lady which she did not do was learn to read or write. I offered to teach her on several occasions but she did not want to learn, saying she would not be like a child, studying at my knee. She kept her ignorance well hidden. I would read out the morning paper to her, to keep her abreast of current affairs so that she could hold her own at dinner parties. Did you guess, Barty, that she could not read? Did you wonder why you never found her with a slim volume of poetry, or the latest novel, in her hand like other ladies?

It was about six months after the visit of her mother, on a cold night in December of 1842 almost exactly a year since we’d buried Georgia, that our daughter Elizabeth was born. Do you remember her, Barty? A delicate, fair child, so like her mother, yet so loving towards her father. You were only four years old when she died. She succumbed, like so many small children, to a fever. I remember how she lay, sweating and moaning, on that last day. Agnes stayed at her side throughout, eating her meals in the sick room, and leaving it only when poor Lizzie had breathed her last.

She was a good mother. She was good to you too, even though, as you have learned, you were not her flesh and blood. No woman could have been a better mother.

Your other sister, Isobella, you do remember, I know, because you have spoken of her. Her looks, of course, were more like mine, dark and heavy. Her personality was her mother’s – she knew how to use her charm to get whatever it was she wanted. That charm worked on you too, Barty, didn’t it? She could twist you any way she wanted. You adored her, doted on her, and would do anything she asked of you. You were blamed, I believe, for many of the pranks and escapades she initiated. And you took that blame squarely on the chin, preferring to be punished yourself than see your cherished little sister in trouble.

Poor Isobella suffered so much with the consumption. You spent hours by her bedside, praying for her recovery, but it was not to be.

And lastly there was William. He was born within a fortnight of Lizzie’s death. He’ll be good for your wife, said the doctor – he’ll keep her busy, be a replacement for the child she’s lost.

How wrong he was. Agnes, I think, never really recovered from losing Lizzie. She found it hard to care for little William, and I was reminded so much of your mother, Barty, and how she had suffered in the months after giving birth. I think Agnes too was reminded of that. Certainly she did all that she could to pull herself together, and get herself up and about again. Did she think perhaps that I would take up with some other servant, and do away with her, and bury her in the garden alongside Georgia?

No, of course not. I was never unfaithful to Agnes. Even after she became bitter and uncaring towards me, and our sham marriage became barren and cold, I did not stray. I had learned the dangers of infidelity. I would not do anything that might risk Agnes’s anger, for who knows what she might have done, if provoked? She might have risked the gallows herself, and led a constable to Georgia’s earthy grave, to spite me.

Yes, we were cold and bitter towards each other, beginning from the month of Lizzie’s death and William’s birth. And yet we had many more years together, shackled to each other by our shared crime. There was no escaping it. We dared not move, and I dared not go away for too long, for fear of a gardener taking it upon himself to turn over the soil around the beech sapling I’d planted beside the wall. I could get up to London and back in a day by rail, for business purposes. I never stayed away overnight. After our initial travels, we never left Kingsley House again.

William grew up healthy and strong, an independent little boy, who had little need for love, affection or company. Did he grow up like this because he received so little attention, or was that his natural constitution? Would we perhaps have loved him more if he’d demanded our love? We shall never know. I am proud of him – a successful London solicitor – certainly he has brains and ambition and will do well in life. I hope in time he will marry, have children of his own, and thus continue the St Clair name.

Or perhaps you will, Barty? Though you are already past the usual age for marrying, it is not too late, and maybe you will find some sweet young girl who is prepared to accept what you can offer her.

But if that happens, Barty, you must promise me, you must bring her to live here. You must not sell this house. You, and only you know what is buried in the garden. It is your own mother there, beneath the beech, beside the wall. You must stay here as her guardian. You are her only living relative. You must remain here and look after her.

Agnes, of course, is buried in St Michael’s churchyard, under a headstone engraved with Georgia’s name. Soon, very soon, I fear, I shall join her. Entombed for all eternity with my partner in crime, while my true wife rots alone under the beech.

You will, I am sure, if you hadn’t already done so when you reached that part of my confession, go to stand beside the beech tree. You might reach out a hand to touch it, wondering if it has taken some of its sustenance from the flesh and bones of your mother, disturbed and muddled now, no doubt, at its roots. Perhaps you will crouch and bury your fingers in the earth, in an attempt to touch some part of the woman who gave you life. Maybe you will go there often. Or maybe you will stay away, averting your eyes from the scene of such an atrocious crime, committed by your own father and the woman you called mother.

Whatever you do, don’t, for heaven’s sake, draw attention to that spot. Don’t let anyone wonder what it is that draws you to it, or repels you from it. Just keep an eye on it, don’t allow the tree to be cut down, replace it yourself should it fail.

Should Tolly Cutter ever call and make any claims on you, please treat him with compassion, and make sure he is provided for. He is, of course, your half-brother, and as much your brother as William is. I have sent money monthly since Mrs Cutter’s visit, but whether it reaches him or not I do not know.

I hope, dear Barty, that you live a long and happy life. You are named executor of my will, and apart from a legacy to William you inherit everything. You will be comfortably off, and will never need to work for a living, as long as you manage your investments well.

You no doubt hate me now, having read the entirety of this confession. Perhaps in time you will learn to live with what I did, and although I would never expect forgiveness, you might begin to understand my actions.

I can only apologise for my part in your true mother’s death, and my subsequent deception allowing you to believe all your life that you were Agnes’s natural son. I cannot imagine how you must feel now, knowing that the woman you called ‘mother’ was in fact your mother’s murderer. It pains me to think of it, as it has done for so many years now. Finally, in writing this confession to you, I feel a small amount of relief of the burden of secrecy. But I have simply passed the burden on to you. I am sorry. So very, very sorry, believe me.

I am tired now, and my end draws ever nearer. I have but one final request to put to you – burn this manuscript. It must not be seen by anyone other than yourself. Do not be tempted to hide it away anywhere, even in the darkest recesses of the house, for surely someone might one day find it. Our secret must be buried for all time, just like your poor dear mother.

Goodbye, dearest Barty, my only legitimate child.

Chapter Twenty-Four: Hampshire, August 2013

‘Mum, I’m confused.’ Lewis spoke through a mouthful of toast.

‘What, love?’

‘So today, right, we’re visiting Nanna Smith in her new home, but she might not know who we are. And if she doesn’t, we’re to pretend we’re just random children off the street.’

‘Er, yes, that’s right.’ Not quite how I’d have put it but he’s got the gist of the plan. We’d been lucky – a nearby nursing home had a place for Veronica and we’d been able to move her into it within a week.

‘Then tomorrow, we’re meeting some random woman who’s our older sister who we didn’t even know we had, and Dad didn’t even know about either. But we don’t have to pretend with her, ’cos she knows who we are and everything.’ He took another slice of toast from the rack and began slathering it with our homemade blackberry jam, made just the day before.

‘Yes, Amy’s coming for lunch tomorrow. And Granny and Granddad will come for tea.’

‘And in case you weren’t sure, poo-face, Granny and Granddad know who we are, and we know who they are. Ow!’ Lauren got her ear flicked from her brother for her less-than-helpful comment. ‘Anyway I can’t wait to meet Amy. I always wanted a sister and now I’ve got one. It’s going to be soooo cool.’ I’d been delighted and relieved by Lauren’s reaction when we told her she had a sister. She’d punched the air and declared the family numbers evened up at last. Lewis had simply shrugged.

‘How come Dad didn’t even know about her?’ said Lewis. ‘Like, he must have been there when he and Amy’s mum…’

‘Yes, well, obviously,’ I cut him off, noticing Thomas’s wide-eyed stare. Lauren sniggered. ‘He split up with Amy’s mum, and she never told him she was pregnant.’

‘Wasn’t she like, fat or something?’

‘She must have been still in the early stages when they split up, so she wouldn’t have been fat, yet.’

Lauren made a face at him. ‘Derr.’

Simon entered the kitchen, running his hands through his hair. I recognised the signs of stress. Today was to be an experiment, to see if we could somehow restart some kind of relationship between Veronica and the kids. And with Amy coming tomorrow, we were extending our family in all directions. Who knew how the two meetings would work out?

‘Ready to go in ten minutes?’ I said.

Simon poured himself a coffee and nodded. ‘I’ll be ready. Kids, you ready?’

Thomas nodded solemnly. Lewis mumbled something through his toast and Lauren left the table and bounded upstairs.

Veronica’s new home was a modern building on the outskirts of Winchester. It was set in leafy grounds, with wheelchair-friendly paths winding their way beside flowerbeds crammed with flowering shrubs. There were inviting-looking benches under rose-clad trellises and a pond with a small fountain and a couple of koi carp. Inside, a pleasant reception area led to the residents’ lounge, which had patio doors opening to the grounds. Simon had loved the place as soon as he’d seen it. I smiled as I watched the kids hurtle through to the gardens to investigate the pond.

‘Mrs Smith is in her room,’ said a friendly nurse. ‘She’s getting on well but is not always confident to come out and socialise with the other residents. It’ll take time for her to get used to her new surroundings.’