Marlford (19 page)

‘Misled me?' Ellie looked at them both, but could not
grasp the meaning of their expressions. ‘That's not possible. Not with something like this. What do you mean? Mr Quersley – what do you mean?'

More than anything, she was aware of her own heaviness, like thick folds of dead skin draping to the floor. For a moment she closed her eyes and let her head loll, but she could not slough it off. She found she had to be there with them, the weight unshakeable.

‘Please. I don't understand. You have to explain… Papa? I've always thought you… Mr Quersley always insisted it was at your instigation. You decided, in consultation with the men, that the girls were a nuisance and best disposed of. Isn't that true? If that's not true – who then? Who killed the babies?'

Oscar raised his face slightly. ‘Well, my father did. You know that.' He paused. ‘He performed the act, followed the orders. But it was Elizabeth, Lady Wilshere – it was your mother – who requested that it be done.'

Ellie wanted to laugh at such absurdity. ‘My mother? No. That can't be right. Why are you saying that? There's no reason why she'd… Mr Quersley, you've always been unequivocal – and why on earth would she do that? She wouldn't do that.'

She knew, for sure. She had seen her mother's poise and grace, imagined it and honed it.

Oscar shrugged. ‘It may be true, I grant you, that I've sometimes suggested your father was more – more intimately involved in your sisters' deaths but—'

‘No, not “suggested”, Mr Quersley. It's been quite clear. You've always been quite clear, quite certain.' This was the worst yet: nothing as it had seemed, everything an
illusion, stranding her. ‘I don't understand. Papa? I don't understand.'

Ernest sighed. ‘It's caddish to bring it all up, Ellie. It's best left. That's why I never said anything. Whatever she was, she has a right to rest in peace.'

‘What are you suggesting?' Ellie's voice was hard and high. ‘Papa, you're not going along with Mr Quersley's story, are you? Not now? Surely you'll own up to it, won't you? You'll admit what you did? You won't let Mr Quersley say these things about my mother?'

‘I'm sorry, my dear.'

‘What do you mean, sorry? No, Papa – you have to be clear… do you mean you're sorry for what you did? Is that it? You're sorry for killing the babies – yes, I can see that… I've always thought you might be sorry. If you'd just say it – so I'm clear.'

‘Ellie, I can't say it. I can't say it because it's not my fault. Not all of it. Not this. Ellie, I'm sorry because Quersley's right in what he says. Your mother didn't take to the girls. She didn't want them.'

‘But that can't be right.'

‘She was from another age, Ellie. A throwback of some kind. That's all I've ever been able to say. When she married me – well, you know, I'm just a Barton. She got the house she wanted and the estate, but she had certain… expectations. She felt her lineage very strongly. Very strongly, indeed. I didn't suit her sense of things. I was never very good at being what she wanted.' He smiled at her, loosely. ‘Even now – after all these years… you see yourself – I'm not very good at all this.'

Ellie took a deep breath but it did not clear her head.
‘Even so, even if that were true… Papa, that doesn't explain why she'd kill her daughters.'

‘Your mother was most concerned that her line should not die out,' Oscar said. ‘She was of excellent stock. Impeccable.'

‘Yes, I know that,' Ellie snapped, keeping her eyes fixed on her father. ‘The coat of arms and everything. I know that.'

‘And she wanted sons,' Ernest added, simply. ‘She felt daughters were – unnecessary. I never bred her the right kind of heir.'

Through the closed window, the sound of the frogs could still be heard, but muted now, desultory.

Ellie listened to the casual to-and-fro of the call for a long while; neither her father nor Oscar disturbed her.

‘I don't think that can be right,' she said in the end, her voice quiet and steady. ‘I don't think my mother would do such a thing, just because they were girls. She wouldn't do such a thing.'

Ernest came towards her and offered his hand to his daughter. ‘You were willing to think it of me.'

‘And so when I was born – another girl—?'

‘She rather despised you, I'm afraid. Despite your loveliness.' His fingers trembled in the air between them. ‘She would never have loved you, Ellie. Not like I've done. She would never have treasured you.'

‘She would have killed me, too?'

‘No, no!' Oscar broke in, shaking his head wildly. ‘We can't be sure of that. There was no time… she was too poorly.'

‘Shut up.' Ellie rounded on him, furious. ‘Don't talk to me. Don't ever talk to me again. You've lied to me, over
and over – the worst possible deception. I can't – I can't think of it just now, not all of it, but don't speak to me. Never speak to me.'

Oscar reached towards her. ‘Ellie – please… it was just…' His objections were stifled by the murmurs in the old manor as the night settled.

She smiled. ‘
The whole house is built in the air and must soon come to the ground
.'

‘Baltasar Gracián, yes, the Jesuit. You see, Ellie? You see what I've taught you?'

‘You've taught me nothing. You've done nothing to help me. I would never have married you, Mr Quersley. Never.'

He saw in her face that this was true.

‘But they promised.' His words faltered. ‘The men… all this time. I thought this was how they wanted it – they promised – this was the future for Marlford.' He seemed disorientated suddenly, his eyes darting from point to point in the room, bewildered. ‘All these years, they asked me to wait – Ellie, they never let me tell you how I love you.'

Her eyes flickered briefly with pity, nothing more.

‘They've played me, haven't they, all this time? They've duped me?' His questions quivered, his voice small. He knew that she was lost to him. He sank back.

Ellie took the hand her father offered, gently, as though it were very fragile, old paper or crumbling clay.

He closed his fingers over hers. ‘How could you have ever thought that of me, Ellie? You'd never have thought it, would you, if I'd been better at living here. If I'd done better here, at Marlford; if I'd been more—' He could not say any more; he felt his suppurating wound torn
fresh apart, wrenched open, a long-held pain suddenly so brutally sore that he was left gasping for breath.

But Ellie was hardly listening to him. She let his hand fall. ‘I'd never imagined things that way, that's all. I'd never imagined my mother to be like that. I'm not sure where it all came from – my way of thinking about things. I mean, it was what they told me, of course, but not just that… It was something else, as though it was all just meant to be a certain way.' She looked at Ernest, puzzled, as though he might not be quite real, just a trick of the dying light. ‘I'm sorry. I don't understand anything,' she said. ‘I have to go.'

She reached for the door; it felt as though the house pitched around her.

Contained within their own miseries, neither her father nor Oscar Quersley attempted to stop her; they hardly glanced at her as she left.

Twenty-Five

T
he men stood in a line, their faces flattened with the surprise of finding the study so changed: the walnut table was pushed to one side, with the chairs stacked beside it; the bookshelves dismantled; the cocktail glasses put away.

They looked from one alteration to the next in silence.

‘We were unsure how it would end,' Hindy said, finally.

Ernest remained seated; his gaze was steady. ‘You let me down, gentlemen. Abandoned me.'

There was the slightest of pauses, enough for Ernest to know that they were surprised by his strength. He stood up. ‘It's been rather an evening – quite a day, all in all. But they've scarpered, anyway. The squatters.'

Luden nodded, slowly. ‘About time.' But his gnarled face twitched.

‘Indeed. Exactly.' Hindy, too, seemed to be struggling to find his usual tone. ‘We knew events would take their course. We just called by to be certain.' He frowned at his colleagues, who looked back at him in blank dismay.
‘We'll go back to the hutments, Mr Barton, and come again tomorrow for faro.'

They perhaps expected him to reply, but he said nothing.

Ata smiled, feebly. ‘We just wanted to wish you goodnight, Mr Barton.'

Ernest was very still. ‘One of them was hurt.'

‘Unfortunate, but unavoidable.' Hindy found something of his usual aplomb. ‘Nothing of any concern, I'm sure.' He scanned the room again, as if trying to fix in his mind the changes that Ernest had made. ‘We're delighted you accomplished your task, Mr Barton. We're delighted that things will return to normal.'

Ernest smiled at them. ‘Ah, but that's the thing, you see. I'm not sure things will return to normal, gentlemen. I'm not sure it's that simple.'

He saw them flinch, a ripple of concern that pulsed down the line of old bodies.

‘What? We don't understand.' Hindy could not quite conceal the brusqueness of panic. ‘Why not?'

‘The intruders have left.' Luden snapped. ‘You've assured us of that.'

Ernest smiled more widely. ‘Yes, I have assured you of that, and you can take my word.' He paused. ‘But, gentlemen, even so, I do believe everything might change.'

‘Mr Barton, you shouldn't say such things.' Ata's distress made him slide his words, his accent coming strong.

Ernest ignored him. ‘It's about time. About damn time, wouldn't you say?' He gave them the slightest of seconds to answer, huffing a laugh. ‘It seems that Ellie—'

‘That girl!' spat Luden. ‘We need to be rid of that girl.'

‘Don't start that. Don't you dare.' Ernest glared.
‘You've been telling her all sorts, I know that. Feeding misinformation – that's what we used to call it – having her on. But the game is up, gentlemen. We're on to you. She's seen that rogue Quersley for the conniving, underhand scoundrel that he is, and she's seen through your stories. She's decided she'll have none of them. None of them. Not a word of the lies you've been telling.' He paused and looked hard at them. ‘Which leaves us with a question – which of course you will have foreseen. And the question is – what shall we do?' He spoke with sudden clarity.

His anger was so contained, such a real threat, that the men stepped backwards together, pushing up against the doorframe.

‘Do?' Hindy echoed.

‘Yes, indeed.
Do
. About you. About our situation here.' He took a breath and went on more cheerfully. ‘You see, my boys, I seem to be getting the hang of things, too. After all this bloody time.' He snorted. ‘I'm getting to understand Marlford, that's the thing.'

The men exchanged quick glances. ‘We shouldn't leave you then,' Hindy said. ‘The affair with the intruders seems to have unsettled you. We should stay.'

‘Very kind, gentlemen, but absolutely no need. No need at all. I'm in fine form. I don't need you.'

‘You're sulking,' Luden hissed. ‘Because we wouldn't fire guns.'

‘No. I don't think I am. I just don't think I need you. I'm all right here.' Ernest stepped forwards. It was unclear what would happen next; the men watched him warily, ready to defend themselves, but he simply reached out and offered to shake hands.

Luden was perhaps too stiff in the joints to respond. It was only very slowly that he raised his hand in reply and placed it limply in Ernest's.

‘Good fellow.' Ernest closed his grip, rattling the old man with the force of his shake. He smiled steadily, delightedly, and passed along the line, finally slapping Hindy on the shoulder.

Hindy puffed and wobbled; for a moment it seemed as though the three of them might tumble, like dominoes.

‘I rather think it's time to take charge of things, don't you?' Ernest finished by asking.

‘Charge of things here?' Hindy managed to reply weakly.

‘Good God, man, what does it matter to you? What business is it of yours?' Ernest's bluster gave way to a laugh. ‘My word, she was quite right… Ellie was quite right about your damn meddling. And I won't have any more of it. Now' – he flapped his hands at them, dismissing them lightly – ‘scoot off, the lot of you, to bed. Haggard old stumpies – you look like you need your beauty sleep.'

His playfulness was unanswerable. He walked away from them, across the study, so that they found there was no choice but to do as he commanded.

Ernest heard their shuffle, the puffs and grunts of exertion as they crammed through the door, none of them allowing the others to pass in front. He shook his head at their absurdity and, when the sound of their footsteps had receded, he found it was an enormous relief.

He eased into his chair again, stiffly, an old man. He was not quite sure yet what would come of the long evening, but he suspected already that it might free him.

Twenty-Six

E
llie stared into the black corners of her room. She shivered, chilled through. Her mind seemed quite empty, devoid of even the most insubstantial of thoughts, her feelings vanished and her knowledge snatched from her, irretrievable. She could not summon a single verse: not a line of philosophy in any language, not the shortest of epigraphs. She could not place herself anywhere but here, sitting on her bed in the absolute dark, her candle burnt out, nothing in the house made to hold or comfort her; her grief nothing more than the faintest of whispers, a moment of confusion in the duplication of steady years.

She seemed to be left with nothing.

She pulled herself stiffly from the bed and tried to relight her candle, but her hand was shaking too violently and the wick was exhausted, so she simply accepted the dark, feeling her way out onto the landing, the faint slap of her bare feet provoking only meagre echoes.

As she made her way down the stairs, her presence did not seem to register at all: it was too slight a thing. It was only when she switched on the light in the billiard room
that she made any impression on the slumbering house.

Ellie picked up her cue and chalked it. She began to play a game, easing the reds towards a pocket. But nothing was quite right: the click of the balls was impatient and teasing, the cue felt heavy in her hands; her action was clumsy. The brilliance of the light over the table seemed too harsh, the rest of the room too dark and damp, and there was an odd swelling lodged behind her breastbone, building, shifting, distracting her, as though she had swallowed a storm cloud. She racked up a score easily enough, but she could not see the point of it.

She stabbed at the white ball but the cue's tip skidded sideways with the force of the thrust, plunging through the tattered baize and ripping a long tear up to the top cushion. Ellie stared at the damage, the disconcerting smoothness of the dark slate beneath, like new skin, and, without warning, the cloud burst inside her, years of anguish unconsoled.

She began to pull at the cloth, tugging apart the tear yet further, sliding her nails into the baize, scratching through the threads, clawing down to the grey stone. She yanked at the cushions, tearing the pockets from their fixings, and then, again, back to the baize, gouging at it over and over until she was in a dull, green haze, tiny threads floating about her, a dust of old fabric filling the air like a fine rain.

In this sudden shower she was fully alive.

Drifting up to the hot, bare light, the dry tinder of the shredded baize, still stiff with traces of old glue, caught fire quickly, sparking flames that ignited the messy electrics. The blaze appeared suddenly at switches, crackling in the
walls in a way that Ellie would have thought impossible. There was smoke stuffing the room within a moment, thick and acrid; noises suddenly all over, like a wind howling within the house. Even as the flames around her stuttered, perhaps dying away, burning themselves out, she knew that they had lit a touch paper to a much larger conflagration.

Marlford was on fire.