A Winter's Child (78 page)

‘I shall be better soon, you know.' But it was a question, addressed with the shyness of a little girl to anyone who might be kind enough to answer.

‘Of course we shall,' said Nurse.

When Claire reached the hall again the floor was still dangerous with broken glass, the butler waiting not to direct its disposal but to remind her of her appointment with Benedict.

‘This way, madam.'

‘Shouldn't somebody clear up that mess?'

‘Certainly, madam.'

He opened the study door, the barricade she thought between Benedict and the sick chaos prowling so insidiously outside, and ushered her in.

He was at his desk, a chair placed ready for her on the other side, an expanse of massive oak and gold-tooled red leather, of folders and official-looking documents, cut glass inkstands and heavy silver cigar-boxes, keeping them well apart; the room around them, into which no one ever came without Benedict's express permission or at his command, remaining unchanged. An oasis. A stockade with the warring natives gathering all around it. How long before they broke down the door?

She shivered.

Noticing it, he gave her a brief smile, not asking the reason, looking self-contained as he always had, busy, a pen in his hand, the limit of his patience not far away. Rather older.

‘I came with a message from Polly.' Someone had to begin. Somewhere.

‘Yes. Arnold Crozier wrote to me. I suppose I shall have to see him. How is Polly?'

Startled, she realized she had not expected him to ask.

‘Sad and scared. And very guilty. But I think she'll be all right in the end. She is terribly pleased about the baby. And don't say she thinks it's just a doll to play with.'

He put down his pen and looked at her.

‘I don't, think I was going to say that.'

And the tug of his mind on hers, the reaching forward of his hands which never moved from the desk top but, nevertheless,
reached out,
the pull, the affinity, the gravitation was – unfair.

It should not be happening now. Not after so long. She didn't want to believe it. And didn't like it. Neither did he. Therefore, say what had to be said quickly. And go.

‘I expect Crozier wants me to pay out her legacies in full.'

‘He said something about settling it on the baby.'

‘Yes. Understandable, when one takes into consideration that it may not be his.'

‘Can you afford to take so much out of the business?'

‘One looks for ways and means. That's what I've just been doing. Moving figures from one column to another. Fortunately – like Arnold Crozier – I'm good at that.'

‘Are things difficult?'

‘At the Mills? As well as can be expected. Better than some. Don't worry. The legacies are safe. Speaking of which it occurs to me you might be needing your own.'

‘Why should you think so?'

He smiled quickly, wryly.

‘To invest in a lakeside hotel perhaps.'

‘Oh. You know about that?' she said, although there was no reason why he shouldn't.

‘Elvira Redfearn knows about it, and draws certain conclusions. And since Elvira is always right –'

He opened a drawer, took out a document, and picked up his pen.

‘This is the authorization to release your capital. I have only to sign it.'

‘Thank you.'

He signed, handed the document to her, she looked at it for a moment and then put it down, neatly, on the desk.

‘Would you invest it for me please, Benedict?'

‘In what?'

‘In Swanfield Mills.'

He looked down quickly, so that she could see nothing of him but the dark, bent head, the rapid clenching of a lean, darktextured hand.

And then he looked up at her.

‘If I do that you could lose every penny.'

‘I don't seem to care.'

‘Your friend Hardie might.'

She smiled at that. Very certain. ‘Kit doesn't need it. He can manage. He'll make a success of that hotel whatever happens.'

And she knew she was very proud of that.

‘He must be immensely gratified by your faith in him.'

She smiled again.

‘I don't suppose it bothers him much either way. He has faith in himself, you see. Enough for two.'

‘Lucky man. Please take your money, Claire and –'

‘Go?'

‘Yes.'

‘You sold the farm, didn't you?'

‘I did.'

‘And everything –?'

‘It seemed best.'

‘And now?'

‘What –
now
?'

‘What do you do now – I mean –?'

‘Nothing Claire.'

‘Nothing at all?'

‘I go to the Mill. I do my day's work.'

‘And then you come back here.'

She couldn't bear it.

‘Of course.'

Night after night, sitting behind this desk, behind that door. No one should live like that. And who could live
with
him, who could penetrate his isolation if she did not? Who could repair the damage she had done him but herself!

‘I see Elvira sometimes.'

‘No you don't. I heard her tell somebody she
never
sees you now. Benedict, it hasn't worked has it? You said you'd be as you were before, and you're not. Are you?'

‘No.'

‘It's my fault.'

‘Yes. I'm afraid so.'

‘What can I do?'

Abruptly he swung his chair around so that he was sitting with his back to her, his voice coming to her like an echo from the far wall.

‘I'm sorry, Claire. I made the attempt. I contacted old acquaintances and found the exercise pointless.'

‘And with Nola?'

‘I failed – just that. Abysmally. And it should all have been so easy. God knows, it would have been a simple matter to turn Nola's head. She's always needed to devote herself to something or somebody, so why not me? She was ripe to fall at somebody's feet. When I took her to Italy I intended to make sure it was mine. I couldn't. It became a physical impossibility. And one cannot conceal reluctance of that sort from an experienced woman. That exercise turned out to be pointless too.'

‘And now?'

‘Unless you come back to me, Claire, I don't think I shall see much point to anything again.'

‘Come back – how –?' She heard her own voice faltering, her breath labouring with shock. She had never expected him to say this, had relied on him, she suddenly realized, not to. The blue chintz room. And nothing had altered. She loved him, she had harmed him, and there was still Nola, still Miriam who needed her now more than ever, still Christian and Conrad who did not care to acknowledge her at all, and to whom she could only be an intruder. And on the other side of the coin Kit – fresh air, smooth tranquil water. Life with a good friend who happened also to be one's lover.

‘Come back and live with me, Claire – that's all.'

‘Here?' Dear God. How could she do that?

‘I need you. I have no faith in my self now. Once – yes. But it's gone.'

‘I took it away?'

‘I believe so. I lost control because of you. You weakened me somehow.'

The ice had melted. She understood. She had endured vivid dreams in which she had seen it happen, grey water spilling out of him all over the dinner table while Miriam and Eunice and Polly went on with their chatter. And it had been her fault. If she had broken him, who else could mend him?

‘I can't leave this house,' he said. ‘You must see that. Not yet. Possibly not ever.'

‘Yes, I see.'

‘And I can't endure it, Claire – not alone. Really – I can't.'

She saw that too.

‘I need you, Claire.'

Closing her eyes, fighting off a sudden vision of an uncomplicated, open-hearted sun glinting from a clear sky over Wansfell Water, she bowed her head.

‘Yes, Benedict.'

‘So you'll come.'

‘I will.' And it was spoken in the hushed, low, not altogether certain whisper of a marriage vow.

‘Here – to High Meadows?'

‘Yes.'

‘As my wife – giving up everything – and everybody. Except that you wouldn't be my wife – not to start with – possibly never at all.'

‘Yes, Benedict.'

‘When Claire?'

It had to be now. That clear, lakeland sky had misted over. The sun had gone in. And she would have to make her arrangements quickly and surely before it came out again.

‘Today, Benedict.'

He swung his chair back to face her.

‘I believe you'd do it too.'

‘Of course –
What!'

‘That's all I needed,' he said. ‘You're free.'

He got up and took her by the shoulders, shaking her gently, his voice almost crooning to her like a lullaby.

‘Claire – Claire – do you think I could do this to you? Of course I couldn't. It saddens me that you can think so poorly of me. I'll handle my own casualties my darling, not inflict them on you. I'm all right.'

‘No you're not.'

‘Yes I am. I indulged myself just nowthat'sall. I asked you to do what I knew you'd find abhorrent, for my sake. I asked you to make a sacrifice. And you agreed to make it. Perhaps we both needed to know that you would. And that's
all.
I shall always know you loved me enough to do it. You'll always know that I loved you too much to let you. It's been said now – and done – and now it's over. We can give our minds to other things. You're free of me. I'm free of you. I needed that very badly. Didn't you?'

She did not believe him. Nor did she recognize in him, what she would have known at once, in another man, to be lightness of heart. In Benedict it had to be a cloak for something infinitely more complex. Something painful. Or sinister. Or dangerous.

‘Benedict – you said you couldn't endure it.'

‘I was lying to you. I've done that before.'

‘You said you needed me.'

‘Well – yes. So does Hardie in his way. I in mine. But what
are
you, Claire? A prize for the one who needs you most? Is that how you see yourself?'

‘Perhaps I do.'

He nodded, briskly, a man suddenly and very definitely in full control of his situation and – as he'd always been – of himself.

‘Very well. And shall I tell you, in my humble opinion, just who the person is, who needs you most of all?'

‘All right.'

‘You, Claire.'

And when she shook her head not in denial but in perplexity he rapped out, ‘Yes Claire. Not me. And not Hardie. Yourself. So go off and enjoy his hotel, or take your money and open one of your own in competition on the other side of the lake, if that seems best to you. Live for yourself now – for a while at any rate. Learn how ro defend yourself. That's what I want from you. Go on –
away.'

She found herself back in John David's car and out on the main road without remembering how she got there, her head swimming not only with confusion but with a great wave of entirely physical fatigue. How much they had tired her out, all of them, worn her down, not so much by any demands they had made upon her but by the demands of her own compassion upon herself. And what had happened to Benedict? What had she done to bring about the change in him? Had it been the offer of her legacy to put back into the business? And then the offer of herself? Yes, she had given in to every one of his demands, made every concession, surrendered totally and quite irrevocably without so much as a murmur of protest. And why – it suddenly occurred to her – should that have wrought such a change in him when, had he been less restrained, more unscrupulous, he could have obtained the same result at any time these past eighteen months? He must know that. Realizing it herself she brought the car to an abrupt halt and spent a moment leaning against the wheel, her mind groping, sifting through words and impressions, nuances, every turn of every phrase that had been spoken, as obsessed as Eunice by the conviction that something – but what? where? – had been missed. He had talked of freedom. But
what
freedom? Fear struck her, nameless only because she refused to acknowledge it. No. Absolutely not. Yet she found herself reversing the car quite wildly in an ill-judged, awkward attempt to turn it round that landed her back wheels in the ditch. And, jumping out, she abandoned it there – John David's pride and joy – and ran back up the hill to High Meadows.

No one was there. No butler waiting, in supercilious enquiry, in the hall. No one anywhere. She had never seen a house so empty. Benedict! His desk, which had been covered with papers, was now completely bare, all those documents concerning the trust funds and legacies, Polly's money, Eunice's money, her money, signed and sealed and put neatly away in correct order so that everybody would know exactly what they were to have and how to obtain it. Everything dealt with, wound up, over and done with. He was free of that too.

Benedict! Running back into the hall, feeling the silence as thick and cold as insidiously piling snow, she shrieked his name to the full extent of her lungs and then, when he was suddenly
there
looking not at all as he ought to be looking at such a moment of high panic, not pained or anguished or bleeding to death, but just a little puzzled, slightly amused, she threw frantic arms around him, crushing herself against him not amorously at all and not caring in the least who saw it, but simply to check that his heart was beating, that he was whole and sound, still captive perhaps but undamaged.

‘I thought –'

‘What?' Incredibly he was laughing. ‘That I was going to shoot myself? Hardly. I once tried to shoot a grouse and I couldn't even manage that.'

‘Don't tease.'

How amazing, when he had never teased before, that he should start now.

But her wild cries had attracted far more notice than she had bargained for and spinning round, weakened but totally single-minded in her relief, it was to see Eunice and Nola advancing side by side towards her, Simon considerably embarrassed and Justin elaborately bored at witnessing yet another of these middle-aged dramas, even Miriam's nurse peering over the banisters losing no opportunity of adding to the store of anecdotes she carried as part of her stock-in-trade from one patient to another.