A Christmas Hope (2 page)

“Good evening, sir,” she said coldly. “I apologize if I am interrupting you. I did not see you in the shadows.”

“I didn’t greatly wish to be seen,” he replied. His voice was very deep and a little slurred, and yet there
was a music in it, a lilt even in those few words. “Then I should have to make polite, inane conversation,” he added.

She herself was not in the mood to be polite, or inane. Her eyes were becoming accustomed to the half-light now, and she could see him more clearly. He was of average height, which meant only an inch or two taller than she. It was hard to tell his age. His heavy hair was dense black, with not a touch of gray, even at the temples, but his face was ravaged by some inner wasting. His dark eyes were ringed with what looked like bruises, and his cheeks were blotched and sunken. His features were strong, his mouth generous, but already either disease or drink had marred him.

“That is what parties are for,” she said, still coolly. “Polite conversation. What were you expecting?”

“Just one person who can see the stars,” he replied, apparently not stung by her tone. “And you never know where you’ll find them.”

She recognized the music in his voice now. He was a Welshman, probably long left the valleys but never quite forgotten them. Surprising herself, she answered him honestly.

“No, you don’t, but they are more likely to be found
among those who are searching than those who would get a crick in their necks if they looked upward.” She wished at once she had not said it. It sounded more judgmental than she had intended.

He laughed. It was a sound of pure pleasure.

“Well spoken, Mrs.… never mind, it doesn’t matter. You will tell me your name and I’ll think it doesn’t suit. I shall call you Olwen …”

She was about to object, then she realized that she liked the name better than her own. She wanted to ask him why he had chosen it, and perhaps what it meant, but that would have betrayed far too much interest.

“Indeed,” she said quietly. “And what shall I call you?”

“Dai Tregarron,” he replied. “I would say ‘at your service,’ but I do little of use. Poet, philosopher, and deep drinker of life … and of a good deal of fine whiskey, when I can find it. And I should add, a lover of beauty, whether it be in a note of music, a sunset spilling its blood across the sky, or a beautiful woman. I am regarded as something of a blasphemer by society, and they enjoy the
frisson
of horror they indulge in when mentioning my name. Of course, I disagree, violently.
To me, the one true blasphemy is ingratitude, calling God’s great, rich world a thing of no value. It is of infinite value, so precious it breaks your heart, so fleeting that eternity is merely a beginning.” His bold stare demanded she answer.

“Wild words, Mr. Tregarron,” she said, but there was no disapproval in her voice. She recognized his name. He was a poet of some acclaim; she was familiar with several of his works. They all had the same lovely, untamed feeling as the words he had just spoken.

“I’m a wild man,” he said with a grin, and she found herself wanting to smile back. “Did you let them tame you, Olwen, put the fires out so you are never burned by them? Do you sit in the dark and the cold and wonder why you were born?”

“You’re drunk,” she said, trying to ignore the truth in his observation.

“Surely, I am,” he replied. “Most of the time. Sober, I’m terrified. The world is too big, and I’m too small and too alone. Drunk, I can see only what I choose to. Can’t walk a straight line—but what’s so good about straight lines? Nature abhors a straight line. Haven’t you noticed that?”

“The horizon is a straight line, at sea,” she answered, wondering why she was even bothering with this ridiculous conversation.

“Ah!” He held up his hand to stop her. “Olwen—Olwen—the world is round. Did they not tell you that? And there are flowers in the grass where you have passed; you’re just so busy looking ahead at your straight horizon that you didn’t see them.”

Suddenly she felt she must escape. She wanted to think of some appropriate riposte, but nothing came to her mind. She mumbled something about needing to find someone and turned away.

Inside, it was all exactly as she had left it: the laughter, the half-heard music, the glittering lights and the swirls of colors, all the faces she knew, and the others that were so alike she might as well have known them.

Almost at once Wallace found her. His expression was sharp with irritation.

“Where have you been?” he demanded. “I have some most important people for you to meet. I wish you would pay attention. We are not here simply for fun, Claudine.”

“Just as well,” she said quietly.

“I beg your pardon?” It was a demand that she repeat herself, if she dared.

“I said, that is just as well,” she answered defiantly. “One should not go to a party simply for fun, especially at Christmas.”

“Sarcasm is very unbecoming to a woman,” he told her, taking her arm with an unnecessarily firm grip and leading her forward to meet the people he considered so important.

A long and joyless hour later, Claudine glanced toward the door to the terrace just in time to see Creighton Foxley stagger in. His handsome face was white and his clothes were torn, dusty, and stained with blood.

Claudine froze, wondering for an instant if she had taken more wine than she thought and that, combined with the tedium, it had affected her wits. Then she realized the buzz of talk was fading in the room. One by one, everybody was turning to stare at Creighton.

One of the young women screamed.

Lambert Foxley made his way through the crowd toward his son. He was a lean and elegant man, a trifle austere looking with his perfect silver-winged hair.

“Good God, Creighton, what the devil’s the matter with you?” he said angrily. “You look as if you’ve been brawling. Are you drunk, sir?” Then, before Creighton answered, Lambert took in the shock on the young
man’s face, and the fact that he was gasping for breath, keeping control of himself only with difficulty.

“What’s happened?” he said more gently. “Are you hurt?”

“No!” Creighton shook his head violently. “No … not … not much. But I think she’s dead …”

Lambert Foxley looked as if he had been struck. “What? What are you talking about? You
are
drunk!” But it was a faint protest, made without conviction. He was beginning to understand that something terrible must have happened.

Now Verena Foxley was fighting her way through the bystanders, her head high, her elegant face twisted with fear. She looked first at her son then her husband.

“Creighton! Oh, my heaven! Are you injured? Lambert, call a doctor!” She turned angrily toward Foxley.

“He’s all right,” he said sharply. “Someone else is hurt … a woman …”

Martin Crostwick emerged from the crowd. He was small, neat, and seemingly in control of things.

“Come now, Creighton, tell us who is hurt and where. Take a deep breath and tell us what happened.”

The words were given in a tone of command, and in
spite of his father’s clear resentment, Creighton turned to Crostwick.

“This woman …,” he began, his voice harsh with emotion. “I don’t know who she is or how she got in here, but she and that … oaf Tregarron were quarreling over something. He struck her, and she fell back then came forward at him, fists flying. He struck her again. We … we tried to stop him, but he was drunk out of his wits, and very strong. He was … completely beyond control. We tried to pull him off her, but I think … I think she’s dead.”

There was a moment of horrified silence.

Several of the women cried out with gasps or sobs.

Verena Foxley stood white and motionless as if she were turned to marble.

“Someone should call a doctor.” Claudine broke the silence, moving forward to stand in front of Creighton, demanding his attention. “In the meantime, take me to this young woman. I have some experience dealing with injuries. I may be able to help.”

Creighton stared at her.

While she waited for him to collect his wits, she thought rapidly about what might be of use. She grasped
some clean linen napkins off the nearest table then a bucket of half-melted ice and a bottle of whiskey. If there were wounds to be cleaned, surgical spirit would be better, but whiskey would have to do.

“What are you …?” Verena stammered.

Claudine ignored her. “Show me!” she said loudly and curtly to Creighton. “Now!”

Lambert Foxley called out something after her, his voice raised and angry, but she took no notice. If a woman was badly hurt, the sooner she was given whatever help was possible, the better.

Creighton led the way toward the terrace where Claudine had been an endless hour ago. He stumbled at the steps and put out his hand to steady himself against the doorjamb. He came face-to-face with Cecil Crostwick, who was pale and whose light brown hair was tousled. His shirt cuffs were also stained with bright scarlet blood.

Claudine was accustomed to both injury and disease at the clinic. Even so, she felt a stab of alarm. She pushed Creighton out of the way and brushed past Cecil and then Ernest Halversgate, who was standing almost in his shadow.

A young woman lay on her back on the terrace paving.
Her fair hair was coming out of its pins; her dress was torn and the skirts all over the place. Worse than that, the bodice was crooked, half off one shoulder, and ruined by deep scarlet splashes of blood. Her face, bruised and swollen, under the caked blood, was ashen.

Dai Tregarron was kneeling beside her, a ripped-off length of her petticoat in his hands as he tied it around her arm tightly to stop the bleeding. Relief flushed his face as he saw Claudine. He straightened up and stepped back.

Ignoring him, she kneeled beside the girl and reached for her neck with the back of her hand to find a pulse. After a second or two she found it, but it was erratic, and she knew it could stop at any moment.

She took a cloth and dipped it in the ice bucket then began gently to wipe away some of the worst of the blood and dirt, looking for the other source of the bleeding apart from the wound already bound.

There were several cuts but none of them deep. Very gently, afraid of what she would find, she put her fingers to the back of the girl’s head, searching for the wetness of blood, the sponginess of shattered bone.

The main wounds seemed to be the gash in her upper arm and another just below the elbow, as if she had tried
to fend off a blow from something sharp enough to tear her flesh.

Claudine used the whiskey liberally and did the best she could with the napkins to make bandages at least adequate to stop the bleeding until the girl could be treated professionally.

She turned to see Lambert and Verena Foxley hovering nearby.

“Has anyone sent for a doctor?” she said somewhat peremptorily.

“Yes, of course,” Lambert replied with something of his usual self-control. “And the police.”

She had not thought of the police, but of course he was right. They must be notified. She looked around, and it was then that she realized Dai Tregarron had gone.

Cecil Crostwick and Ernest Halversgate shot quick glances at each other. Creighton Foxley was standing close to his father.

“Who is she?” Claudine asked, still on her knees beside the girl.

Cecil gave a helpless shrug. “Tregarron called her Winnie.” He looked at Ernest again. “We don’t really know her.”

“I thought he said Winnie Briggs, but I’m not certain,” Creighton added.

Lambert Foxley swore under his breath. “What on earth is a woman like this doing here, Creighton?”

“I don’t know,” Creighton said defensively. “Tregarron brought her. You’d better ask whoever invited him. It all …” He gulped. “It all erupted out of nothing. One moment everything was good-natured, the next she and Tregarron were screaming at each other. We tried to stop it. He was really vicious, and we were afraid it was going to get ugly, but it was all so quick.” He looked at the other two young men for support.

“He was totally drunk,” Cecil said bitterly. “The man’s a lunatic.”

Claudine was overwhelmed with a wave of disappointment. Perhaps Wallace was right and she was a naïve fool.

She could do nothing more for the girl, at least for the moment. She climbed to her feet feeling heavy and awkward. No one moved to assist her.

“We should take her inside,” she said to Foxley. “She’ll freeze out here.”

“Where on earth should we put her?” Verena asked, her eyes wide, as if the idea were made in bad taste.

“Somewhere warm,” Claudine replied. “What about the housekeeper’s sitting room? There’ll be a fire there.”

“I can’t ask the Giffords’ housekeeper to give up her sitting room to a … a woman off the street!” Verena exclaimed.

Claudine raised her eyebrows very high. “I was assuming that they would tell her, not ask her,” she said very coolly. She expected a blistering reply but was angry enough not to care.

Verena’s face flamed, but she turned in her tracks and stalked back into the great room. A few moments later, the butler came out with two footmen to carry the still-unconscious young woman.

Fortunately the doctor came within the next ten minutes, but it was a full half hour after that before the police arrived. They were led by a Sergeant Green, a soft-spoken man in his early forties who looked as if he had been on arduous duty all day and had expected to be home at his own hearth by this hour. Nevertheless, he was even tempered and conducted the questioning of the guests with courtesy.

The conclusion he came to was exactly what Claudine had feared it would be, but she could say nothing that would make it any different. Winnie Briggs had
joined the party, either from a nearby establishment or off of the street, at the invitation of Dai Tregarron. Nobody else knew her, and unfortunately—but perhaps very wisely for his own survival—Tregarron had fled the scene. No one knew where he had gone.

Creighton Foxley, Cecil Crostwick, and Ernest Halversgate were all agreed that Winnie and Dai had quarreled violently. He had attacked her, and—in spite of the efforts of all three of the other young men to prevent him—he had seriously injured her.