The Silent Tide (42 page)

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I went to the bathroom, then I heard Mother call out. Her breathing was a bit laboured so I fetched her a glass of water.’

‘Is she better now?’

‘Yes, she took something. I’m sorry to wake you.’

‘As long as she’s all right.’ ‘Yes. Go to sleep now.’

He settled down and turning his back on her, seemed to fall asleep at once, but she lay there for some time, staring into the darkness, unable to dispel the sense that something was wrong.

The following morning, Hugh’s mother sent down word that she’d like her breakfast delivered on a tray. Isabel told Mrs Catchpole that she’d take it up.

When she entered it was to find the old lady sitting up in bed, breathing strenuously. Later the doctor came and prescribed ephedrine. Her condition improved over the next few days and everyone relaxed once more.

As Isabel suspected, Stephen McKinnon could not or would not raise an advance of anywhere near £ 500 for Hugh’s novel, no matter how highly he rated it. But the sum promised, £ 200, was twice as much as for
Coming Home
, and McKinnon wrote him such a complimentary letter that Hugh seemed to forget his threat to go elsewhere. Or perhaps the rival publisher had seen the book and not liked it, or not liked the price, Hugh didn’t choose to explain. Three weeks later, he returned from London one day to announce that McKinnon & Holt would publish
The Silent Tide
in the spring.

The new man, Richard Snow, wants me to make a few adjustments,’ he told Isabel, when she ventured that she hoped she could read it soon. ‘Very small things. Let me do those first.’

During November, he shut himself in his study and worked on the manuscript every day.

Unknown to him, upstairs, Isabel wrote too. Page after page she stowed in her bedside drawer. She wrote about everything – her family, her move to London, the people she’d met. All of it poured out of her with freshness and passion.

Emily

She’d reached the final page now and Isabel’s voice, which had seemed to fill the room, fell silent. Again the story had stopped abruptly and Emily felt disappointment that there was no more. She shuffled the delicate pages together and laid them with the others, some still in their envelopes, on the dishevelled pile on the coffee table.

Arms round her knees, she sat in the pool of light from her table lamp, absorbed in the world of a woman sixty years ago. How fresh and full of hope Isabel had once been, a life of promise spread out before her, and how her bright flame had dwindled. Emily was still not sure what exactly had happened to Isabel in the end, nor how to find out. If she could only discover where these fragments of manuscript came from, then perhaps the mystery would be solved. She’d thought about this a lot. It was probable that they were from some source within the Parchment building, but where? Someone employed at the archives, perhaps, in Gloucestershire? But who there could possibly have an interest in Hugh Morton or even have known that Emily was the editor responsible for the biography? Perhaps the very fact she’d asked for the files had alerted someone. She mulled over that idea. No, the copy of
Coming Home
had been left in her pigeonhole
before
her request to the archives. There had to be a different answer.

She considered ways she could advertise for the mysterious person to get in touch, but all the ones she could think of – emails to the whole office, or notices in the lift – had drawbacks. They’d have everyone thinking she was odd, paranoid. Perhaps the thing to do was to play along and see what happened next. Surely at some point the person would reveal themselves.

She picked up her mobile, smiled briefly at a cheerful text message from Megan, and switched off the table lamp. The rest of her living room came drearily into focus. Dirty supper plate on the table. Her office bag, still containing unread scripts, lying by the door. Tomorrow’s problems. She sighed, and taking the plate to the sink, dropped it into the washing-up water and watched it sink to the bottom. She was still in this thoughtful mood when she climbed into bed. She dreamed of diving into deep black water and trying to fight her way to the surface again, her lungs bursting for breath.

Days passed and there were no more mysterious packages. On Sunday, she gave Joel a copy of the latest instalment when they went back to his after lunch with friends in a local restaurant.

Thanks, I’ll have a look,’ he said, putting it down on his desk with hardly a glance. He brought mugs of tea across and sat next to her on the sofa.

Thanks. So what did you think of the last part I gave you? Did you read it?’ she enquired.

‘Of course I did. It backs up my own discoveries,’ he told her. ‘Isabel was unstable mentally. That must be why the marriage ultimately went wrong.’

This puzzled Emily. ‘Unstable? I don’t see that. She was probably depressed. It happened to my sister after Harry. Everyone was worried until the doctor got on to it.’

‘All those hormones sloshing around,’ Joel said, his eyes twinkling. ‘Poor Hugh must have felt at his wits’ end.’

‘Don’t be contemptuous,’ she said. ‘Anyway, in Isabel’s case I think it was more than that. She found herself in a role she couldn’t play.’

He considered this carefully. ‘That role thing must have happened to lots of women then. It was part of the culture. Don’t you think most just made the best of it?’

‘That doesn’t sound very sympathetic.’

‘I’m totally sympathetic. I suppose as his biographer I’m trying to look at the matter from Hugh’s point of view. He must have felt trapped in a situation way beyond his experience. The doctor didn’t seem much use. Jacqueline and Hugh’s mother seemed fairly helpless, too. What could he have done? That’s how things were then.’

‘I see what you mean.’ Emily was thinking how alone Isabel must have felt. She’d been so young, so lacking in advice or any perspective, her own mother struggling with health problems, her mother-in-law rigid and judgemental. ‘So you wouldn’t examine the marriage more – shall we say objectively – in your book?’

She sensed Joel’s discomfort. He got up and started to pace around. ‘I feel I have done,’ he said. ‘I don’t think that you’re being unbiased yourself, Emily. You seem set on turning Hugh into the villain of the piece.’

‘No, really. I understand that Hugh was a man of his times.’

‘Exactly – that’s how people like him thought then. You can’t blame them for that, can you?’

‘He was quite selfish.’

‘Perhaps we should blame his mother for that.’ Joel smiled. ‘She was awful, wasn’t she? No, what I meant was that you can still tell Isabel’s story.’

He sighed. ‘Where it’s relevant, yes, and where I’ve got sufficient evidence. That ragbag of a memoir is not reliable, especially since it was written when Isabel was depressed. And I’m certainly not going to run some present-day feminist viewpoint on the matter.’

‘Joel, you know that’s not what I mean.’ Emily stood up and went to the window, trying to hide her frustration. There was an injustice to be righted here. Isabel’s story was not generally known and it had become increasingly obvious to her that Jacqueline Morton and Joel were happy to keep it that way.

Joel said, ‘Of course I’ll read all the new stuff you’ve given me. And take a judgement . But it’s me writing this book and I’ve got to follow the way I think best.’ There was a sharpness to his tone and she sensed she was offending his pride.

‘Of course,’ she said wearily, turning to face him. ‘I don’t mean to interfere, but . . .’

‘But what?’

‘I don’t know.’ He was right about it being his book, but she was his editor . She felt justified in giving him advice and she did genuinely feel that Isabel deserved a prominent part in Joel’s biography. But it was more than that.

The quest for Isabel had become a personal mission of hers and Joel seemed to be standing in her way; their whole relationship was becoming a battleground in this struggle. What was she to do? She looked out of the window In the street below, a young man was crouching to soothe a screaming toddler, struggling to get out of its pushchair.

She felt Joel move behind her, his arms enfolding her waist, drawing her back into the room. He nuzzled her neck and she shivered with desire. ‘Let’s not quarrel any more ,’ he whispered in her ear. ‘It’s not worth it.’

‘I’m not quarrelling,’ she murmured, turning in his arms and raising her face to his. ‘I’m arguing. That’s different. Arguing can be good.’
It’s silence that is bad
. Who had said that to her? As Joel bent to kiss her mouth, she gave herself up to the very delicious feelings running through her body, but when his hands began to move over her breasts through her delicate cashmere top, arousing her, she suddenly remembered. It was Matthew.

‘Shall we . . . ?’ Joel’s breath was hot in her ear.

‘Mmm . . .’ she said, closing her eyes, her body arching towards him. Their mouths met in a deep searching kiss that banished all thought but of the here and now as he lifted her up and carried her to the bedroom.

On the bus home that evening she wondered why, despite the thrill of their love-making, she felt so at odds with herself. It was months since she’d broken up with Matthew and here was Joel, who she was so attracted to, was free to be with and wanted to be with. And yet memories kept getting in the way. Matthew. What if she never got over him, could never love anyone else as much ever again? It didn’t bear thinking about.

The argument that she’d had with Joel about Isabel bothered her, too. She didn’t know Joel very well, yet couldn’t feel sure of him. She wondered what his feelings were for her, apart from the obvious physical attraction, that is. He seemed so self-contained, even in his love-making, never whispered her name . . . Oh, it was all so confusing.

She was still distracted by all this when she arrived at work the following day, but when she found another tranche of Isabel’s story lying in her pigeonhole she snatched it up eagerly. At lunchtime, with the office quiet, she read it as she ate her sandwich, quickly absorbed by Isabel’s world.

Isabel

One morning at the beginning of December 1952, Hugh left for London, giving Jacqueline a lift. He was going for professional reasons he said, and would stay several nights in Kensington. Jacqueline would stay one night only, to check on her house and do some Christmas shopping. Later the same day, Isabel opened the front door to a young man with a telegram for Jacqueline.

‘Mrs Wood isn’t here at the moment, but I’ll let her know,’ she told him. She telephoned Jacqueline’s London house several times during the course of the day, but there was never any answer.

By evening, the telegram still sat ominous and unopened on the hall table, and Hugh’s mother fretted about what it might contain. ‘Suppose it’s news about Major Wood? One feels so
responsible
,’ she kept saying.

Finally, Lavinia Morton tried ringing Hugh to ask what might be done. It wasn’t until late in the evening that he answered the phone. Isabel, who was passing through the hall on her way up to bed, heard her say, ‘Oh, do you? Yes, it might be as well.’ She replaced the receiver and told Isabel, ‘Hugh’s going round there straight away to try and find her.’

The telephone rang only a short while later. Hugh’s mother answered. ‘Jacqueline, thank heavens you’ve called.’ From the drawing room, Isabel heard the clunk of the receiver being placed on the table and the older woman’s hoarse breathing as she fumbled the envelope open.

‘Oh!’ she said in tones of relief, then picked up the phone and told Jacqueline, ‘Thank God. He’s coming home, dear. I’m so glad.
Extended leave stop.
That’s all it is. Your husband is on his way back to England.’

As Isabel lay in bed, waiting for sleep to come, the relief she’d heard in Lavinia’s voice echoed in her own mind. With her husband coming home, Jacqueline would presumably move back to London properly. The oppression Isabel felt with her presence would be gone. They could all get on with their own lives again.

During the night, she surfaced from sleep to hear Lorna wailing softly. She waited a minute or two, but the crying subsided. As she lay trying to sleep again, she found her thoughts take a darker turn. It was as though a formless shadow of a nightmare swept over her, stifling all hope and happiness. For a while she could hardly breathe, but finally the shadow passed and she fell once more into a troubled sleep. When she was dragged out of it by her child’s more urgent cries, it was dawn, a pale and cold one.

During the day, Jacqueline telephoned again to say that instead of returning that evening as planned, she was staying in London to wait for her husband. to meet you aid=" like movement

Hugh wasn’t due home for another two days and he, too, rang that evening. He had a meeting with his editor, he told Isabel, some contacts to look up and a couple of Christmas parties to attend, if he could. The fog’s getting very bad here,’ he went on. ‘The traffic’s at a standstill. It’s very difficult to get anywhere.’

It was early the following morning before everyone was up that Isabel was awakened by the ringing telephone. She grabbed the receiver, fuddled with sleep. It was Hugh.

‘Jacqueline’s just called,’ he said. ‘I’m afraid I have bad news. There’s been an accident.’

He went on to explain that Major Wood’s plane had landed at a military base in Norfolk late the night before, but that instead of waiting until morning, Michael Wood had insisted on being driven to London straight away. The car had run into thick fog in Central London and had driven off the road at Piccadilly and overturned. Major Wood was gravely injured and in hospital. The driver had died at the scene.

Emily