The Shape of Sand (14 page)

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Authors: Marjorie Eccles

Tags: #Mystery, #Historical

BOOK: The Shape of Sand
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“He obviously couldn't stand us one more day – he was probably as sick of us as we were of him,” said Daisy cheerfully.
“Daisy!
I will not have you speaking like that, of one who was a guest in this house!”
Daisy stared round-eyed at her father, blushing to the roots of her hair, with difficulty stopping herself from bursting into tears. He had never before reprimanded her outspokenness. She was, after all, known in the family for her irreverent comments, which normally evoked a tolerant smile. “I — I'm sorry, Papa.”
His face cleared, he patted her shoulder. “Well, well. But no more of it, hm?”
But Daisy had only been voicing everyone's thoughts. Valery Iskander had not been a man one could be comfortable with. Doubtless he did very well in his own country, but he'd been out of his element here at Charnley Yet he had stayed on, seemingly unaware of overstaying his welcome. After more than a week, by which time everyone had said all they had to say to him, and conversation was beginning to reach the desperate stage, his going was undoubtedly a relief.
Luncheon was announced. The saddle of mutton with red-currant jelly, the apricot tart to follow, were got through
somehow, a strange affair without Beatrice presiding over the table. No one seemed to want to eat much. Everyone tried to avoid looking at the clock as the hands crawled round, and still Amory deferred the search.
Eventually, telephone calls were made. The Jardines had an intricate web of friends and relations, measured by the thickness and complexity of Beatrice's address book. But to tell the truth, it was impossible – ludicrous! – to go so far as to believe that she would have suddenly taken it into her head to visit any one of them, without prior warning or a word to her family. Nevertheless, Harriet took on the task of calling the likeliest, using more guile as to the reason for her calls, so as not to arouse undue alarm or suspicions, than she had dreamed she possessed. Only when she rang Stoke Wycombe did her flimsy pretexts fall flat.
“What's wrong, Harriet?”
“Oh, Uncle Myles!”
It was such a relief to pour it all out, to have the ear of someone who listened intently, put sensible questions and then, when all the facts had been made known, announced that he was driving over to Charnley immediately, despite the fact that he'd only just arrived back home from there. As she hung up the receiver, Harriet felt better just for knowing he would soon be on the scene, with his gift for organising, and his common sense and indefatigable energy.
 
“Come, Amory, what are you thinking of? Marcus is right, an immediate search must be made of the house, the grounds,” he announced immediately on his arrival, clasping his friend's shoulder. It was now late afternoon, there was not a moment to be lost, he urged.
“Very well.” Amory was pale and tense, outwardly controlled but betrayed by the constant tugging at his long upper lip, and by his eyes, which by now were frantic. It was as apparent to him now as to everyone else that he really had no choice but to agree.
A search of the grounds was commenced by all the outdoor staff, supervised by Wycombe, aided by Marcus and two of the footmen. After a while, Amory took himself off to make a
personal search of the house, moving methodically through the splendid confusion of rooms, every nook and cranny of which he had known intimately for fifty years, sparing no effort, even to ransacking through its long-forgotten attics and squeezing through the window which gave out on to the leads, from where he'd shot at pigeons as a boy. He searched through chests and trunks and the little corner room off one of the staircases, always known as the priest's hole, though whether it ever had been used as that was a moot point. He omitted nowhere, not even the cellars – but he found nothing. And what had he expected? That Beatrice, of all people, had suddenly lost her mind and had wandered off to one of these farthest reaches of the house and got herself trapped, locked in, perhaps fainted? Well, an accident of some sort was the only possible explanation that was now lodging uneasily in everyone's mind.
No one yet had mentioned dragging the lake.
The searchers returned, without success. It had grown too dark to carry on, but they were prepared to start again in the morning, at first light. A hush gradually settled over the house, servants tiptoed about as if there had been a bereavement, irritation and incomprehension turned to real worry and finally, as the unnatural day dragged on into night, dread. Nothing in the bewildered family's well-regulated lives had prepared them for this feeling that they were all lost in the dark, wandering without any landmarks. They simply had no idea what to do. There was no precedent to follow because nothing like this had ever happened before. People – especially someone as well-conducted and predictable as Beatrice – did not simply disappear into thin air.
Then the certainty that she must turn up, somewhere, that she would be found, ill or injured – even Daisy's wild surmise that she might have been abducted, and some sort of ransom note might be expected – was eventually rudely scotched by Hallam's report that certain of Beatrice's belongings had also disappeared.
“You are sure you are not mistaken?” asked Amory, blankly.
“No, sir. A grey walking costume and a small valise, underclothes and her silver-backed hairbrush,” Hallam recited
stiffly, her hand to her flat bosom. “It was only when I noticed her hairbrush missing that I thought to check on her other things.”
Of course the woman was not mistaken about this. She knew every item of her mistress's wardrobe intimately. She was a disobliging creature, all too easily disposed to take the huff, but there was no denying she was utterly dedicated to Beatrice and all her concerns and was without doubt blaming herself for not having checked it earlier. It must have cost her a great deal to report on what she had discovered, for there could now no longer be any doubt that Beatrice's disappearance had been a deliberate act.
It was unclear who first made the connection between her disappearance and Valery Iskander's unscheduled departure. Perhaps it was Amory who saw the connection first, from whose lips a shocked exclamation burst. It was followed by a stunned silence. Daisy's eyes filled with tears, horrified that her flippant remark about the two running off together had been nearer the truth than anyone could have realised, and fervently hoping that Vita would not remember it.
Vita, however, was struggling against her own unworthy first thoughts: how could she do this to me? Why did she not at least wait until after the wedding? For she knew now that if the unthinkable should turn out to be true, then Bertie's mother would never allow him to marry her, Vita, the daughter of a fallen woman. Through some oddity of his father's will, Lady Rossiter more or less had control of her son's fortune until he was twenty-five, so Bertie would have no choice. Still, she was ashamed of herself for thinking these thoughts at a time like this and hoped the tears would not fall. She looked at the floor, in case Harriet divined what she was thinking – she was always so quick to latch on to these things.
But Harriet, too, was busy with her own reactions, endeavouring to convince herself that such a thing just wasn't possible. Of course, women before now had caused scandals by eloping or bolting with unsuitable men – look at Millie! – but there had never been a breath of anything scandalous or indecorous connected with Beatrice – a little flirting, perhaps, here and there, but that was the commerce of fashionable
society, and with renowned beauties such as Beatrice, it was understandable, and did not count. And, well …
Iskander!
As for Marcus – his first instinct after the revelations had been to rush upstairs and into the west wing to find Rose Jessamy. Preoccupied with her work, it had barely seemed to register with her when he had told her earlier that his mother was missing, but Marcus knew she would, all the same, have heard and remembered it. She was so sharp and penetrating, so defensive of her position as an artist, it was easy to dismiss her as self-absorbed, yet he'd found that her judgement of people and situations was usually cool, but right. If there had been anything between his mother and this fellow Iskander, Rose would have been the one to notice. He longed for her calm detachment. But he restrained himself, knowing instinctively that she would certainly tell him that his place, at the moment, was here with his family.
“Even if one can begin to contemplate such a thing happening, Father,” he said, “Mama would not have failed to leave a note to tell you, at least, what she intended. She is
meticulous—”
He broke off, flushing, running a hand through his hair. “That sounds r-ridiculous, in the circumstances, but even so, I'm sure she w-wouldn't …”
Wycombe said, “As a matter of fact I rather agree with you, Marcus. Simply by going away like this at all, your mama hasn't acted in anything like her usual rational way, so leaving without a note of explanation might be difficult to believe, but must be accepted.” His thoughts were in turmoil. Good God, this was the very devil! Of all things, he hadn't expected this. “Well, he's capable of it,” he said grimly at last, voicing a coda to his own speculations, barely aware that he had spoken this last aloud.
“But – Beatrice?”
“Beatrice too, Amory, I'm afraid. We've all underestimated her. There – there have always been unexplained depths to her-” He broke off abruptly. “I should not have said that, I am overstepping the line.” Yet despite his bracing attitude, which was to be expected of one who had confronted and been in charge of worse situations than this, there sounded to be some underlying shock, as if something in him that he was not able
to accept had been challenged.
“No, no, Myles,” Amory replied. “We must look the truth in the face. But before jumping to conclusions, we must be absolutely certain. All this is speculation. We have no means of knowing if she really has gone with Iskander.” He added with an unexpected touch of bitter humour, “But if that is the case, it is to be hoped he's rich. She has taken nothing with her of any consequence, according to Hallam. Except the new garnets - and those,” he added with some irony, “are of little value, compared with some of her jewels, and unlikely to bring in enough to keep Beatrice in anything more than gloves and stockings for long.”
Marcus said, suddenly, “This is a temporary madness! She will return, I know she will.
Nothing
would have made her leave us all like this if she were in her right mind!”
There came into the room a sudden ray of hope. Then everyone looked at Amory and the same thought entered every mind: what would Amory do if she
did
return?
EXTRACT FROM HARRIET'S NOTEBOOK
Yet another day has gone by, and the shock waves have not yet settled, the ripples are still spreading from the dark centre of the pool where the stone was thrown in. We are all restless, unable to settle, and earlier this evening, I wandered up to Mama's bedroom, where I stood looking at the rich elegance spread around. Papa is right about one thing, at least. She will find living without luxury insupportable, not to mention an existence beyond the pale of society, even if she means to live in Egypt for the rest of her life. Ostracised! I simply do not understand how she could willingly have chosen that – when she knows very well what it will mean to her, she who has always lived surrounded by people whose high opinion is paramount to her. Especially not with the example of Millie Glendinning before her. Simply for an
affaire?
Try as I will, I cannot envisage my cool, sophisticated, conventionally worldly Mama suffering some overwhelming passion for anyone – let alone Valery Iskander! — allowing it go so far beyond her control that she has lost sight of all she is forsaking. Yet what other explanation is there for her reckless behaviour? We know nothing of Iskander, or of the circumstances in which they first met. Papa might know more than he is saying (and remembering the unquestioning way he seemed to accept the reason for her abrupt departure, it seems to me he very likely does) but I for one could never pluck up the courage to ask him.
The bedroom curtains had not been drawn together and bright moonlight silvered the room; it bore a strange, abandoned, forlorn aspect, but I was reluctant to light a lamp. Whether I was viewing the scene coloured by the loss we were all experiencing, I had no means of knowing, but the things she had left behind seemed to be invested with a poignant life of their own, reminders that stirred a complex web of emotions in me. Mama and I have not always seen eye to eye, but I have always loved her. Or have I – truthfully? A dutiful affection, yes, I feel that, but true, profound love, such as I have for Papa? I do not know, but
even so, I am tormented by the knowledge of how dreadfully unhappy she must have been to reach the point where she could abandon us all. And more than that: why have none of us ever seen it? Feelings of self-blame and guilt are an indulgence we cannot afford, but still I ask myself if my sisters, too, have felt this same faint remoteness between herself and her daughters which I think I have always sensed, without being consciously aware of it. Marcus – well, like most men, I suspect, he adores his beautiful mother.
I wish I could share his unshaken belief that she will return. Sometimes I do indeed believe that one day she will reappear, and everything will return to normal, just as if she had never gone away, but at the same time I live in dread of the consequences if ever that should happen. Papa is such a stickler for correctness, that everyone around him must live their lives honourably; it goes without saying that his wife must be beyond reproach. I cannot even consider the possibility of his overlooking what she has done and taking her back on condition that she behaves herself for the sake of outward appearances. Yet the alternative, divorce, would be equally unthinkable. Divorce puts both parties at the mercy of civilised society. Marital misdemeanours may, and do, occur, but they must not be seen to occur. As it is, tongues will begin to wag soon enough, there can be no hiding for long the fact that my mother has gone. It will undoubtedly cause shame to fall on her name, and as for Papa – well, he is bound to suffer more, trying to carry on with his life, knowing that everyone knows she has made a fool of him. He is not a man who can bear to be laughed at.
I could not keep still, and was pacing about the moonlit room while thinking all this. Clara Hallam had tidied it, but had left one or two items lying where they were, a sentimental touch which I would not have suspected the woman capable of. An abandoned white kid glove lay on the arm of a peach velour chair, an extensive array of Mama's cosmetics was lined up on the dressing table. A nightgown of dove-grey silk was lying across the cream satin counterpane, ready for wear, pinched in at the waist by Hallam as though her body were inside it, flung back in a pose of abandon. Hallam, when she told us, said her mistress had taken little else but the grey walking costume, something I found so difficult to believe of Mama – she who changes her clothes several times a day! – that I decided now to check for myself.
But Hallam was right, nothing else appeared to be missing. I even opened the wardrobes where her furs were kept, cedar-lined to keep out the moths, unlikely as she is to need furs in Egypt. There they all were – the sables which my father gave her rippling sleekly under their protective shoulder wraps, and still clinging to them was that distinctive scent she orders to be made up specially for her in Paris, by Worth. Her favourite cloak hung there, a long, exquisite garment of gold tissue, also lined with sable; silver foxes and a soft, thick velvet evening coat of mole colour, trimmed with miniver.
Closing the door, I noticed that same scent lingering on the air in the room itself, yet overlaid by something faintly rotten. Those lilies on the dressing table, that was it! They were over, past their best, already beginning to fester in the tall glass vase. The lilies Kit had given her for her birthday.
Kit. He is going to take it very badly. He admires Mama so tremendously. There has always been an unusual rapport between them, and something being said beneath the surface that for some reason I have never cared to probe. We haven't seen him at Charnley since Mama went. I am disappointed in him, I thought he would have rushed down here immediately to offer his sympathy. I have been waiting, longing to unburden myself, but he has not yet come.
A difficult decision lies ahead for me. It does not need second sight to see that as the eldest daughter, it will be universally accepted that my moral responsibility is now to take over Mama's social duties for my father's sake. Escape, to a worthwhile life of my own, would now seem to be even more out of the question than before, at least until I marry, when I might well simply be exchanging one form of imprisonment for another. Unless, of course, I were to marry Kit.
I believe he, at least, would never expect me to sublimate my own desires and pretend to be a conventional wife. He would respect my need for fulfilment outside the boundaries of running a home and raising children. I should be allowed to follow my own inclinations, to study as I wished … but to marry simply to gain such freedom seems to me the worst form of dishonesty.
Papa, for one, has never been against a match between us nor, I believe, was Mama, though I never fully understood her attitude. On the one hand, she urged me to make up my mind before it was too late, on the other, she constantly warned me of what
might be in store if Kit and I were to marry. As if I had not worked that one out for myself!
I am racked by indecision. Do I truly love Kit? That dangerous attraction he has for me somewhat frightens me in its intensity, for I realise it is not necessarily love. But even if it were, marrying him could be a disaster. He could never, for instance, be the rock against which I could lean in times of stress, as my father has been for my mother. Nor, I suspect, does he have that capacity for faithfulness which one might expect from a husband. While I have no desire to possess another human being utterly – I would despise myself if I had – I do not want to share him with a side of his nature over which he has no control. But – he makes me feel alive. He teases me and makes me laugh, not always an easy task, I admit. I feel
right
with him.
I had had enough of such thoughts. And suddenly I had no wish to be in this room any longer.
I turned to go, and it was then I noticed the grey suede journal on the writing table by the window. I had once or twice seen Mama making entries in this book, but she always put it away when anyone came into the room. It had a tiny brass lock, and I picked it up, though without any intentions of forcing the lock and intruding on private thoughts. She must have overlooked it in her haste to leave, but the thought that someone else – Hallam, perhaps, if she had not already done so – might find a way of opening it and reading it, made me slip it inside my pocket.
 
The following week was one which, for the rest of her life, Harriet could never contemplate without despair. A week which was an awful anti-climax to those events which had gone before, and was the beginning of the path towards what inexorably followed some time afterwards. A week in which hope died.
The police later went over everything that had happened from the time when Beatrice disappeared to the time of the fatal tragedy, in an effort to find out what had caused it, but not as much as they might have done, had they not previously been told about her leaving. Marcus had refused to give up on his insistence that the police should be informed of her flight, even in the face of his father's indifference and Wycombe's warnings about the publicity which would inevitably ensue.
“What can the police do that we haven't done?” Amory had said heavily. During the space of a week, he had grown older and greyer. He had been brought up not to exhibit his feelings, but the struggle not to do so was clearly almost too much for him. He would pull out of it, he assured his children, but it was difficult to believe. An accidie seemed to have entered his soul, utter despair. “Supposing they trace her, supposing they do find her with this fellow Iskander, are they going to force her to return?”
“I simply won't believe she is so lost to all decency that she has gone off with that man! Dash it, Father, she may have had some sort of brainstorm and be wandering God knows where. She may even b-be–”
“Marcus!” said Wycombe quietly.
Amory, roused out of his own lethargy by his son's evident distress, put a hand on his sleeve. Marcus subsided. “All right, Father. I'm sorry. But if there's any chance at all, shouldn't we take it? We must
n-n-never
give up hope of finding her and p-persuading her to return!”
He was silenced by the look on his father's face, but then Amory said heavily, turning away, “Do as you wish, my boy, do as you wish.”
“Perhaps Marcus is right, old friend. Maybe it would, after all, be in everyone's interests to inform the police,” said Wycombe, after several moments' deep thought.
So they were called in, though afterwards Marcus said they might have saved themselves the trouble. The two policemen who came were from the local force. Uncomfortable at dealing with the gentry on such highly personal matters, and working under directives from on high, they seemed happy to accept the obvious conclusions, without too many questions. “I'm afraid it seems to be a cut and dried case, sir. Your wife and the Egyptian gentleman disappearing on the same day, as it were,” said a sergeant by the name of Maitland, an inexperienced young man with baby-blue eyes who looked as though he wasn't old enough to be told about such things.
They asked the obvious questions, received the expected answers, which Maitland's constable wrote laboriously in his notebook. Then he said, “It's been a week – and you have had
no communication whatever from your wife, sir?”
Amory, who had already told them this, merely nodded.
Maitland coughed and said, with as much reproof in his tone as he dared, “It might have made things easier, sir, if you had reported the disappearance at once.”
“We believed she would return,” Marcus said. He met the baby-blue eyes and saw they were not by any means as guileless as he had at first thought. “As she still might. Or be found, at any rate.”
“I shouldn't hold out too much hope of that if I was you, sir. Not much chance of tracing anyone, once they're out of England – and as for Egypt!” Egypt might well have been beyond the stratosphere, as far as he was concerned. He added, speaking once more to Amory, “as I believe the Chief Constable has – er – already indicated, sir.”
So someone had had a quiet word in the ear of the Chief Constable, and perhaps the Lord Lieutenant of the county as well. The Home Secretary, even, it was tempting to think. At any rate, it was clear that whatever Maitland himself thought, what he was saying had come first from the lips of higher authority. To Harriet, at least, it was obvious they were just going through the motions.
“Well now,” the sergeant went on heartily, “you say you have carried on with your normal life, sir, this week? You and your son went up to your chambers in London just as usual?”
“As to that,” said Amory heavily, “things will never be normal again,” a sentiment which was later recalled by Sergeant Maitland and his constable.
But it was inevitable that a modicum of normality returned, although the focus of the house had disappeared, its centre fallen apart. No one had realised how Beatrice had managed the smooth running of Charnley, without seemingly raising a finger. It barely existed without her. Mrs Betts carried on the usual housekeeping routine, knowing exactly what had to be done, but it was not the same. They had the identical menu for dinner twice running in one week.
A few days after Beatrice's disappearance, Wycombe departed, there being nothing else he could do, and on the same day Rose Jessamy announced that in view of what had
happened, she, too, would be packing her bags and leaving.
“But you can't!” said Marcus. “You can't leave the rooms as they are! Mama would want you to finish them. What will she do if she comes back and finds them half-finished?”

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