The Reckoning (30 page)

‘I always let her down,' Aylesbury said with a moan.

‘
You mustn't. And I'll tell you how to go on. When I got a
really terrible wound in front of me to dress, one that made
me feel sick and faint, I managed by thinking of it as separate
from the person. Not a wounded soldier, but just a leg, all on
its own, with no person attached. And I'd think, well, here's
some blood that needs wiping away, and here's a splinter that
needs removing, just as if it was – I don't know – a piece of
carpentry, or some other job like that to be done.’

Aylesbury looked at her helplessly, and she went on, ‘So
you see, when you have to face up to some terrible dowager –
all purple turban and diamonds the size of pigeons' eggs –
just break her down into little pieces. Here's a mouth that's
asked a question, and there's an ear that I've got to speak
into, and there's a gown I have to admire without laughing –’

He grinned reluctantly. 'Maybe I could,' he said.

‘
Of course you could. Just don't think of them as people.
And I'll tell you something else I've learned, Aylesbury –
when they talk to you, they don't really think of you as a
person, either. All you've got to do is memorise the things
each set of people expects you to say, and say them. They
won't care if you mean them or not. They don't really want to
know what you think. They just want to hear the right things
said at the right time.'

‘But how will I know what's the right thing?'

‘
I'll help you. And
I
expect Tommy knows a lot of them. He
was going around drawing-rooms with Mama when you and I
were still in the nursery.'

‘
Yes,' Aylesbury said slowly, feeling more comfortable. 'I
do thank you, Rosy. It's very kind of you to take all this
trouble with me. But how do you know all these things? You
suddenly seem very grown up and wise.'

‘Oh, when a man knows he's to be hanged in a fortnight,
it
concentrates his mind wonderfully, you know,' she said casually. 'Come on, they're rested now. Let's have one last gallop
to the park gates.’

*

At his mother's request, Weston entered her dressing-room and found her alone, sitting before the mirror. She turned,
and her face lit at the sight of him.

‘
My dear boy!' She held out her arms, and he went to her
to be embraced.

‘
Well, Mother?'

‘
You can't think how good it is to hear you call me that! Sit
down, my darling, sit here.' She moved over so that he could
share with her the long stool in front of the dressing-table. He
sat, and picked up a small pot she had been using and
examined it.

‘Rowland's Essence of Magnolia — for a glowing, delicate
complexion,' he read. 'What's this? Mother, have you taken to
using cosmetic lotions? I'm shocked! Does Lord Theakston
know?'

‘
Don't tease me,' she said. 'It's Theakston's own suggestion
— my skin gets so dry when I'm out riding all day that it's
sometimes quite uncomfortable. It's medicinal, you see — not cosmetic.’

Weston put the jar down and smiled at her. 'I didn't think
it could be to make you more beautiful. You're already as
beautiful as an angel — any more'd be unfair.'

‘
Such nonsense! You're getting to be an accomplished flat
terer,' she said, pleased in spite of herself. 'Oh, but I've
missed you, Tom! Tell me, how do you go on at Eton? Are you
happy there? Have you made many friends?'

‘
I do well enough, Mother. Hampton's settled down, and
his stutter's almost gone. I think he'll do very well, next half.’

‘
And Aylesbury?'

‘
He's begun to make friends amongst the seniors, which is
a good thing. It isn't right that he should be with me and
Hampton all the time. It makes the other senior men think
he's a muff.' He caught her involuntary expression, and said
sternly, 'You don't give him credit, Mother. There's a lot of
good about him. You'll see, once he's got over his shyness.’

Lucy stirred restlessly. 'But why does he always appear
such a stammering ninny in front of me? When I asked him
how he liked the horse this evening, for instance —'

‘
Because he's frightened of you. If only you could be
gentler with him —'

‘
If he weren't so frightened of me, I could be kinder to
him,' she countered. 'But it irritates me when he starts like a
deer every time I speak to him.' She sighed. 'I know it's
unfair, Tom, but I just can't love him as I do you.'

‘
Yet he's my brother,' Thomas said simply. 'My father's
son. If you love me for my father's sake, why not Aylesbury?'

‘
I don't know,' she said helplessly. 'I think sometimes
perhaps I shouldn't have told you that. It seems to make
things more complicated.'

‘
You had to tell me,' he said. 'You can't keep secrets from
me.’

No,' she agreed, looking with renewed and astonished love
at his calm, intelligent face. He was not like a child, at
moments like these, but a companion; but then he had been
her shadow since he was four years old. 'Does Aylesbury know
— about his real father?’

No,' he lied easily. 'But in any case, what's a "real" father?
Lord Aylesbury accepted him, so he was his father in every
possible way that mattered. For the rest —' He shrugged, and
then seeing her grave expression, grinned and said, 'He's the
earl and I'm the captain's son, and we both know who has the
best of it!’

She laughed with a sudden release of tension. 'But you
haven't told me how
you are
getting on at Eton,' she said. ‘Do
you like it?'

‘
Yes,' he said, though without great enthusiasm. 'It's pretty
country, and some of the other boys are jolly. But the rules
and traditions are so foolish, it's hard sometimes to make
myself remember them.'

‘
That's heresy,' Lucy said. 'Traditions are sacred, and the
rules —' She hesitated, not knowing, of course, what they
might be. 'Well, what would the place be without rules? You have to learn to obey, my darling. We all need to understand
discipline.'

‘
Yes, I know that,' he began, and wondered whether he
could explain to her how it seemed to him that there was no
good reason for any one rule rather than another; that they
could have been taught discipline just as well sitting at their
desks with pen and paper, writing it down like a mathemat
ical theory. The strange rituals, the beatings, the bullyings, the
fagging and flogging, the bounds and out-of-bounds, the where-you-might-wear-a-hat, the what-you-might-eat and
where-you-might-walk, all seemed to him as arbitrary and
therefore pointless as a pattern of raindrops in the dust. He
conformed to it all because his mother wanted him to succeed
in that strange world, and he wanted to please her, but as to
its having any
intrinsic
value, his native intellect denied it
utterly.

He contemplated for a moment trying to tell her all that;
but then, looking at her adored face, he saw the anxious look
in her eyes, and noticed for the first time the faint hatching of
fine lines around them. He realised that she was not the other half of his soul, and though he loved her and knew she loved
him, there were ways in which they were different. She was of
a different generation: she probably wouldn't understand.

So he said, 'I do all the things I'm supposed to do. I like it
there, Mother, but I'd sooner be at home with you.’

The anxious look disappeared. She opened her mouth to
speak, but was prevented by a scratching on the door, which
opened to admit the polite head of Lord Theakston.

‘May I?'

‘Yes, come in, Danby.’

The body, in a handsome maroon silk dressing-gown,
followed the head. Theakston looked expectantly from one to
the other, and then said, 'Well, is it done? Have you told him,
my love?’

Lucy smiled at her husband. 'Not yet, I haven't had the
chance. But now you're here, I think you should do it.’

‘
Oh, no, surely it would come better from you?'

‘I insist, Danby. You're the head of the family now.'
Thomas looked from one to the other. 'Is something in the
wind, sir?’

Lord Theakston, unexpectedly shy, stood before Weston, tried out his hands in his pockets and then behind his back,
cleared his throat a couple of times, and plunged in. 'The
thing is, Thomas, that I felt – well, your mother and I felt –
that your position was rather anomalous. Perhaps a trifle
uncomfortable for you at times.'

‘Sir?'

‘
You know – being with your brother and mother and
sister, and having to pretend not to be related. And then
again, I wondered if you might sometimes worry about your
future. I know you'll have your father's money, but it isn't a
large fortune, and you have no official family. No-one to fall
back on, so to speak.'

‘No, sir,' Thomas said, still mystified.

‘
So your mother and I felt that it would make things easier
all round – make the situation tidier, if you like –'

‘
It was Theakston thought of it,' Lucy interrupted. 'I'm
ashamed to say it didn't occur to me, though as soon as he
said it, of course, I agreed entirely. Tom, with your approval,
Theakston would like to adopt you as his son. Legally, you
know – all the papers. And then we'll really be your parents.
You'll inherit anything Theakston has to leave, and Aylesbury
will be your brother, and you'll be able to call me Mama in
public –'

‘
And me Sir, of course,' Danby finished with a glimmering
eye.

‘What do you think, Tom? Does it please you?’

He looked from one to the other, for once in his life at a loss
for words. He was, after all, in spite of his precocity, not yet
quite thirteen. 'Yes,' he said at last. 'Very much.' He looked
at Danby. 'Thank you, sir.’

Danby beamed at him shyly. 'Very fond of you, my boy –and I've known you all your life. Almost feel as though you
were
my
son.'