Songs of Love and War (3 page)

Kitty watched him stand up and walk through the wall. ‘He’s gone,’ she said, dropping her shoulders in defeat.

‘Where?’

‘I don’t know. He’s quite bad-tempered, but so would
I
be if I were stuck between worlds.’

‘Shall we leave now?’ Bridie’s teeth were chattering.

Kitty sighed. ‘I suppose we must.’ They made their way back down the spiral staircase. ‘You won’t tell anyone, will you?’

‘I cross my heart and hope to die,’ Bridie replied solemnly, wondering suddenly whether her friend wasn’t a little over-imaginative.

In the bowels of the castle Mrs Doyle was expertly making butterballs between two ridged wooden paddles, while the scrawny kitchen maids were busy peeling potatoes, beating
eggs and plucking fowl for that evening’s dinner party, to which Lady Deverill had invited her two spinster sisters, Laurel and Hazel, known affectionately as the Shrubs, Kitty’s
parents, Bertie and Maud, and the Rector and his wife. Once a month Lady Deverill invited the Rector for dinner, which was an obligation and a great trial because he was greedy and pompous and
prone to spouting unsolicited sermons from his seat at her table. Lady Deverill didn’t think much of him, but it was her duty as Doyenne of Ballinakelly and a member of the Church of Ireland,
so she instructed the cook, brought in flowers from the greenhouses and somewhat mischievously invited her sisters to divert him with their tedious and incessant chatter.

When Mrs Doyle saw Bridie she pursed her lips. ‘Bridie, what are you doing loitering in the corridor when I have a banquet to cook? Come and make yourself useful and pluck this
partridge.’ She held up the bird by its neck. Bridie pulled a face at Kitty and went to join the kitchen maids at the long oak table in the middle of the room. Mrs Doyle glanced at Kitty, who
was standing in the doorway with her long white face and secretive mouth that always curled at the corners, as if she had exclusive knowledge of something important, and wondered what she was
thinking. There was something in that child’s eyes that put the heart crossways in her. She couldn’t explain what it was and she didn’t resent the girls playing together, but
Bridie’s mother didn’t think any good would come of their friendship when, as they grew older, their lives would inevitably take them down different paths and Bridie would be left
feeling the coldness and anguish of Kitty’s rejection. She went back to her butter. When she looked up again Kitty had gone.

Kitty’s attention had been diverted by the loud crack of gunfire. She remained for a moment frozen on the back stairs. It sounded like it had come from inside the castle.
There followed an eruption of barking. Kitty hurried into the hall to see her grandfather’s three brown wolfhounds bursting out of the library and heading off up the staircase at a gallop.
Without hesitation she ran after them, jumping two steps at a time to reach the landing. The dogs raced down the corridor, skidding on the carpet as they charged round the corner, narrowly missing
the wall.

Kitty found her grandfather in his habitual faded tweed breeches and jacket at the window of his dressing room, pointing a rifle into the garden. He gleefully fired another shot. It was lost in
the damp winter mist that was gathering over the lawn. ‘Bloody papists!’ he bellowed. ‘That’ll teach you to trespass on my land. Now make off with you before I aim properly
and send you to an early grave!’

Kitty watched him in horror. The sight of Hubert Deverill shooting at Catholics was not a surprise. He often clashed with the poachers and knackers creeping about his land in search of game and
she had eavesdropped enough at the library door to know exactly what he thought of
them
. She didn’t understand how her grandfather could loathe people simply for being Catholic –
all Kitty’s friends were Irish Catholics. Hubert’s dogs panted at his heels as he brought the gun inside and patted them fondly. When he saw his granddaughter standing in the doorway,
like a miniature version of his wife with her eyebrows knitted in disapproval, he grinned mischievously. ‘Hello, Kitty my dear. Fancy some cake?’

‘Porter cake?’

‘Laced with brandy. It’ll do you good. Put some colour in those pale cheeks of yours.’ He pressed the bell for his valet, which in turn rang a little bell on a board down in
the servants’ quarters above the name ‘Lord Deverill’.

‘I was born pale, Grandpa,’ Kitty replied, watching him open his gun and fold it over his arm like her grandmother held her handbag when they went into Ballinakelly.

‘How’s the Battle of the Boyne?’ he asked.

She sighed. ‘That was last year, Grandpa. I’m learning about the Great Fire of London now.’

‘Good good,’ he muttered, his mind now on other things.

‘Grandpa?’

‘Yes.’

‘Do you love this castle?’

‘Minus point for a silly question,’ Hubert replied gruffly.

‘I mean, would you mind if you were stuck here for all eternity?’

‘If you’re referring to the Cursing of Barton Deverill, your governess should be teaching you proper history, not folklore.’

‘Miss Grieve doesn’t teach me folklore, Grandma does.’

‘Yes, well . . .’ he mumbled. ‘Poppycock.’

‘But you would be happy here, wouldn’t you? Grandma says you love the castle more than any Deverill ever has.’

‘You know your grandmother is always right.’

‘I wonder whether you’d mind terribly living on—’

He stopped her before she could continue. ‘Where the devil is Skiddy? Let’s go and have some cake before the mice eat it, shall we? Skiddy!’

As they made their way down the cold corridor to the staircase they were met by a wheezing Mr Skiddy. At sixty-eight, Frank Skiddy had worked at Castle Deverill for over fifty years, originally
in the employ of the previous Lord Deverill. He was very thin and frail on account of an allergy to wheat and lungs scarred by a chest infection suffered in early childhood, but the idea of
retirement was anathema to the old guard who worked on in spite of their failing bodies. ‘My lord,’ he said when he saw Lord Deverill striding towards him over the rug, followed by his
granddaughter and a trio of dogs.

‘You’re slowing down, Skiddy.’ Hubert handed the valet his gun. ‘Needs a good clean. Too many rabbits in the gardens.’

‘Yes, my lord,’ Mr Skiddy replied, accustomed to his master’s eccentric behaviour and unmoved by it.

Lord Deverill strode on down the front stairs. ‘Fancy a game of chess with your cake, young lady?’

‘Yes please,’ Kitty replied happily. ‘I’ll set up the board and we can play after tea.’

‘Trouble is you spend too much time in your imagination. Dangerous place to be, one’s imagination. Your governess should be keeping you busy.’

‘I don’t like Miss Grieve,’ said Kitty.

‘Governesses aren’t there to be liked,’ her grandfather told her sternly, as if liking one’s governess was as odd an idea as liking a Catholic. ‘They’re to be
tolerated.’

‘When will I be rid of her, Grandpa?’

‘When you find yourself a decent husband. You’ll have to tolerate him, too!’

Kitty loved her grandparents more than she loved her parents or her siblings because in their company she felt valued. Unlike her mama and papa, they gave her their time and attention. When
Hubert wasn’t hunting, fishing, picking off snipe around the estate with his dogs or in Dublin at the Kildare Street Club or attending meetings at the Royal Dublin Society, he taught her
chess, bridge and whist with surprising patience for a man generally intolerant of children. Adeline let her help in the gardens. Although they had plenty of gardeners, Adeline would toil away for
hours in the greenhouses, with their pretty blancmange-shaped roofs. In the warm, earthy air of those glass buildings she grew carnations, grapes and peaches, and nurtured a wide variety of potted
plants with long Latin names. She grew herbs and flowers for medicinal purposes, taking the trouble to pass on her knowledge to her little granddaughter. Juniper for rheumatoid arthritis, aniseed
for coughs and indigestion, parsley for bloating, red clover for sores and hawthorn for the heart. Her two favourites were cannabis for tension and milk thistle for the liver.

When Hubert and Kitty reached the library, Adeline looked up from the picture of the orchid she was painting at the table in front of the bay window, taking advantage of the fading light.
‘I suppose that was you, dear, at your dressingroom window,’ she said, giving her husband a reproachful look over her spectacles.

‘Damn rabbits,’ Hubert replied, sinking into the armchair beside the turf fire that was burning cheerfully in the grate, and disappearing behind the
Irish Times
.

Adeline shook her head indulgently and resumed her painting. ‘If you go on so, Hubert, you’ll just make them all the more furious,’ said Adeline.

‘They’re not furious,’ Hubert answered.

‘Of course they are. They’ve been furious for hundreds of years . . .’

‘What? Rabbits?’

Adeline suspended her brush and sighed. ‘You’re impossible, Hubert!’

Kitty perched on the sofa and stared hungrily at the cake that had been placed with the teapot and china cups on the table in front of her. The dogs settled down before the fire with heavy
sighs. There’d be no cake for them.

‘Go on, my dear, help yourself,’ said Adeline to her granddaughter. ‘Don’t they feed you over there?’ she asked, frowning at the child’s skinny arms and tiny
waist.

‘Mrs Doyle is a better cook,’ said Kitty, picturing Miss Gibbons’s fatty meat and soggy cabbage.

‘That’s because I’ve taught her that food not only has to fill one’s belly, but has to taste good at the same time. You’d be surprised how many people eat for
satisfaction and not for pleasure. I’ll tell your mama to send your cook up for some training. I’m sure Mrs Doyle would be delighted.’

Kitty helped herself to a slice of cake and tried to think of Mrs Doyle being delighted by anything; a sourer woman was hard to find. A moment later the light was gone and Adeline joined her
granddaughter on the sofa. O’Flynn, the doddering old butler, poured her a cup of tea with an unsteady hand and a young maid silently padded around the room lighting the oil lamps. Soon the
library glowed with a soft, golden radiance. ‘I understand that Victoria will be leaving us soon to stay with Cousin Beatrice in London,’ said Adeline.

‘I don’t want to go to London when I come of age,’ said Kitty.

‘Oh, you will when you’re eighteen. You’ll be weary of all the hunt balls and the Irish boys. You’ll want excitement and new faces. London is thrilling and you like
Cousin Beatrice, don’t you?’

‘Yes, she’s perfectly nice and Celia is funny, but I love being here with
you
best of all.’

Her grandmother’s face softened into a tender smile. ‘You know it’s all very well playing with Bridie here at the castle, but it’s important to have friends of your own
sort. Celia is your age exactly and your cousin, so it is natural that you should both come out together.’

‘Surely, there’s a Season in Dublin?’

‘Of course there is, but you’re Anglo-Irish, my dear.’

‘No, I’m Irish, Grandma. I don’t care for England at all.’

‘You will when you get to know it.’

‘I doubt it’s as lovely as Ireland.’

‘Nowhere is as lovely as here, but it comes very close.’

‘
I
wouldn’t mind if I were cursed to remain here for all eternity.’

Adeline lowered her voice. ‘Oh, I think you would. Between worlds is not a nice place to be, Kitty. It’s very lonely.’

‘I’m used to being on my own. I’d be very happy to be stuck in the castle forever, even if I had to pass my time with grumpy old Barton. I shouldn’t mind at
all.’

After playing chess with her grandfather Kitty walked home in the dark. The air smelt of turf smoke and winter and a barn owl screeched through the gathering mist. There was a bright sickle moon
to light her way and she skipped happily through the gardens she knew so well, along a well-trodden path.

When she reached the Hunting Lodge she crept in through the kitchen where Miss Gibbons was sweating over a tasteless stew. Kitty could hear the sound of the piano coming from the drawing room
and recognized the hesitant rendition as sixteen-year-old Elspeth’s, and smiled at the thought of her mother, on the sofa with a cup of tea in her thin white hand, subjecting some poor
unfortunate guest to this excruciating performance. Kitty tiptoed into the hall and hid behind a large fern. The playing suddenly stopped without any sensitivity of tempo. There was a flurry of
light clapping, then she heard her mother’s voice enthusiastically praising Elspeth, followed by the equally enthusiastic voice of her mother’s closest friend, Lady Rowan-Hampton, who
was also Elspeth’s godmother. Kitty felt a momentary stab of longing. Lady Rowan-Hampton, whom her parents called Grace, was the most beautiful woman she had ever seen and the only grownup,
besides her grandparents, who made her feel special. Knowing she wasn’t allowed downstairs unless summoned by her parents, Kitty reluctantly retreated upstairs by way of the servants’
staircase.

The Hunting Lodge was not as large and imposing as the castle, but it was suitably palatial for the eldest son of Lord Deverill, and much larger than its modest name suggested. It was a rambling
grey-stone house partly covered by ivy, as if it had made a half-hearted attempt to protect itself from the harsh winter winds. Unlike the castle, whose soft, weathered stone gave the building a
certain warmth, the Hunting Lodge looked cold and austere. It was icy and damp inside, even in summer, and turf fires were lit only in the rooms that were going to be used. The many that
weren’t smelt of mildew and mould.

Kitty’s bedroom was on the top floor at the back, with a view of the stables. It was the part of the house referred to as the nursery wing. Victoria, Elspeth and Harry had long since moved
into the elegant side near the hall and had large bedrooms overlooking the gardens. Left alone with Miss Grieve, Kitty felt isolated and forgotten.

As she made her way down the narrow corridor to her bedroom she saw the glow of light beneath the door of Miss Grieve’s room. She walked on the tips of her toes so as not to draw attention
to herself. But as she passed her governess’s room she heard the soft sound of weeping. It didn’t sound like Miss Grieve at all. She didn’t think Miss Grieve had it in her to cry.
She stopped outside and pressed her ear to the door. For a moment it occurred to her that Miss Grieve might have a visitor, but Miss Grieve would never break the rules; Kitty’s mother did not
permit visitors upstairs. Kitty didn’t think Miss Grieve had friends anyway. She never spoke of anyone other than her mother who lived in Edinburgh.