The Love Child (33 page)

We searched all round the house and beyond. I said I wondered whether she had tried to get to the sea. She was talking about it yesterday.

“She wanted to come with us,” said Carl. “She was here when we left.”

“What tune was that?”

“It was just after two o’clock.”

“But she was supposed to be resting then. Sally had sent her to bed.”

“She said she wanted to come with us and I said, ‘You can’t. We’re going to the haunted house.’ She kept saying she wanted to come. So we went off and left her.”

“You don’t think …”I began.

“The house is nearly a mile from here,” Leigh pointed out.

“She knows the way,” said Carl. “We rode past it only the other day. She said she wanted to see a ghost.”

“She’s been listening to gossip,” I said. “That’s where she’s gone. I’m sure of it.

Carl and Benjie were going and she wanted to go with them. Come on. We’re going to Enderby.”

Leigh said we should ride there, for we should get there more quickly that way, so we ran to the stables and in a. short time we were on the road to Enderby.

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We tethered the horses and dismounted. The drive was so overgrown that we had to pick our way carefully. I must confess to a little shudder as we passed through the gates. There was something eerie about the place which seemed more than the state of the grounds warranted. The house rose before us-red Tudor brickcentre hall with east and west wings; the walls were covered with creeper, which hung over some of the windows.

It was easy to imagine why it had been called haunted.

Eager as I was to search the place I felt a great repugnance about entering it.

“Creepy,” commented Benjie.

“You can get in quite easily,” said Carl. “You just unlatch the door. We didn’t see any ghosts,” he added.

“No,” put in Benjie, “but you felt they were there … watching you.”

“We must go in,” I insisted. “We have to search the place.”

Then I felt my blood run cold, for I saw a light flicker in one of the windows and then disappear.

“Someone’s there!” I gasped.

“I’m going in,” said Leigh.

We unlatched the door and stepped into the hall. The door shut with a bang behind us. Only a little light came through the dirty windows. I looked up at the great, vaulted ceiling; the stone walls were damp; there was a great staircase, which must have been beautiful once, and over which the lady of the household had tried to hang herself.

Yes, it was a haunted house. It repelled me. It was almost as though there was an atmosphere of hostility, something which warned me to keep out.

Then we heard a noise above. The opening and shutting of a door. Someone was there.

There must be. We had seen a light.

“Carlotta,” cried Leigh in a loud voice, “are you there? Come here, Carlotta. We have come for you.”

His voice echoed through the empty house.

“Carlotta! Carlotta!” I cried in anguish.

Could she really have come here alone? I had a terrible premonition that we were going to discover something fearful.

“Listen,” said Leigh.

We distinctly heard the sound of footsteps and they were not those of a child.

“Who’s there?” called Leigh.

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There was a movement from above and we saw a face on the balcony … the balcony over which the rope had been thrown.

A man was standing there.

“Have you come to see the house too?” he asked.

He started to descend the stairs. There was nothing ghostly about him. He was by no means young and was quite soberly dressed hi a frogged coat and grey velvet breeches; his clothes were quiet, well cut and of good quality.

“We are looking for a lost child,” said Leigh. “We thought she might be here.”

“A lost child,” he repeated. “I have seen no one.”

I felt ill with disappointment and anxiety.

“We have reason to believe she may have come here,” said Leigh.

“Yes,” went on Carl. He turned to Benjie. “You remember I said I heard something.

You said I thought it was the ghost.”

Benjie nodded slowly.

“We must look for her,” I insisted. “We mustn’t waste any tune. She’ll be frightened.”

“I have been over the house,” said the man. “Some of it is very dark. But I had a lantern which I have left up there.” He pointed upwards. “I haven’t seen a child, but of course there are so many rooms. I doubt I have seen everything.”

“We shall search every corner,” said Leigh.

“I will join with you,” the man replied.

“Let’s all keep together,” suggested Leigh, “and we will search from top to bottom.

She may be shut in somewhere. Come on, we’ll waste no more time.”

We searched the hall and the kitchens. We went into the outhouses, and it was in the washhouse that I found a button lying on the floor. It had come from Carlotta’s coat.

I pounced on it. It was the most hopeful sign we had had. I was sure now that Carlotta was in the house and I was not going to leave it without her.

“This is her coat button. She has been in here,” I cried. “She must be in this house now. She must.”

We went up the stairs-those sad, haunted stairs which creaked protestingly under our feet. There was the balcony where the minstrels had once played hi the days when it had been a happy home with tragedy undreamed of.

There were heavy curtains at either side of it and an alcove in which musical instruments had been kept. There was a door in it. I opened it and there, lying fast asleep, was Carlotta.

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I swooped on her.

She opened her eyes. “Hello, Cilia,” she said.

I just held her in my arms and stepped out onto the balcony.

Everyone cried out joyfully at the sight of us. Carlotta looked at them all in surprise.

“Did you come to see the haunted house?” she asked. She looked at the stranger. “Who’s that?” she said.

I said: “Carlotta, we have been looking for you. You have been naughty again. You were supposed to be in your bed.”

She laughed. She was so enchanting when she smiled and I was overcome with such happiness to have her safe that I could only laugh with her.

“I wanted to see the haunted house,” she explained. “They went.” She pointed to Carl and Benjie. “They wouldn’t take me with them.”

“Well, we’ll get home now quickly,” said Leigh. “Do you realize that they are all worried about you? Sally will have something to say to you, I can tell you.”

Carlotta was momentarily sober.

“A happy conclusion to our search,” said the stranger.

“We are sorry to have intruded on you,” I replied. “And thank you for your help.”

“It was a very interesting encounter. I shall always remember the charming young lady who was asleep in the cupboard. If I take the house I shall call it Carlotta’s cupboard.”

“You must have the house!” cried Carlotta. “I want it to be called Carlotta’s cupboard.

You will have it, won’t you?”

“Just to please you, I am sure that the gentleman will,” cornmented Leigh.

“My name is Frinton,” said the man. “Robert Frinton.”

I felt my senses swimming. Frinton! Jocelyn had been a Frinton. It was not an unusual name, and yet on the other hand it was not a common one.

“I am Leigh Main and this is my wife, her brother and my half brother. There are rather complicated relationships in our family. Come back with us and have a meal.

That is, if you have time. We must hurry now because they are all anxious about this errant child.”

“What’s errant?” asked Carlotta.

“What you have been,” I replied fondly.

“Is it something nice?” she asked complacently.

Robert Frinton was saying how happy he would be to accept our invitation. He felt almost inclined to buy the house since it would mean that he would acquire such pleasant neighbours.

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His horse was at the back of the house, which was why we had not seen it when we arrived, and soon we were all mounted, Carlotta riding with Leigh, and on our way back to Eversleigh.

There was great rejoicing when we arrived. Sally Nullens and Emily Philpots were waiting in the courtyard, and Sally pounced on Carlotta and demanded to know what she had been up to, the bad, wicked girl, giving us all the fright of our lives and going off like that.

Emily said: “And look at your gown. All dirty. And you’ve caught that lovely stitching.

I shall never be able to get that right, you see.”

Harriet smiled on the child benignly; my mother was beaming with delight and my father was trying to look stern and failing completely, while Carlotta smiled at us and said: “He’s going to call the cupboard Carlotta’s cupboard. It’s after me … because I went to sleep in it.”

“People that goes off and worries the life out of everyone don’t get cupboards named after them,” pronounced Sally. I burst out laughing. It was rather wild laughter, I suppose, because Leigh put his arm about me and said, “We’re forgetting to make the introductions.” And he told Robert Frinton who everybody was and my mother said how delighted she would be if he stayed and ate with us, and she would love to hear what he thought of Enderby.

Carlotta was put to bed with a scolding from Sally and Emily. I went hi to see her when I was ready for dinner. She was in bed by then. I think the walk to Enderby’s had tired her out, which was why she had promptly fallen asleep, after the manner of children.

She was none the worse for the adventure, but it struck me that she was growing up fast and we should have to be watchful of her. She was going to be wayward. I had always known that. I would talk to Sally about her the next day.

I kissed her and she smiled happily as I did so; she was half asleep but aware of me. I loved her so much and I wondered how I should feel when I had Leigh’s child, which I supposed I would in time.

I did not believe I could ever love any child as I loved this one.

Over dinner we learned that Robert Frinton was of the same family as Jocelyn.

“There was trouble in our family,” he told us. “A great tragedy it was. My brother and nephew were the victims of that archvillain, Titus Gates.”

“Ah, yes,” said my father, “I remember that well.”

“They confiscated much of his property. My brother was older than I and had the family estate. We lost it all. I have been compen-214

sated now but shall never go back to the old place. I was wondering about this Enderby Hall. It has possibilities.”

“It used to be a delightful place,” said my mother. “Once the garden has been cleared up and the house cleaned out, I think it should be all that it used to be in the past.”

“I think so, too,” said Robert Frinton. “I have a fancy for this part of the world.”

He looked at us rather shyly. “It was a strange way that we met this afternoon, but the fact was I was hoping to call on you. I wanted to thank you for all you did for my nephew.”

He was looking at my father who said: “Don’t thank me. I knew nothing of it until it was over.”

I said: “It was Leigh, my husband, and my brother Edwin … and, of course, Lady Stevens who did so much. It could have worked. We could have saved him … but circumstances were against us.”

“I know. He was taken and murdered. Yes, it was murder and I will call it nothing else. That man Gates deserved the worst possible fate and so do all those who were afraid to stand up against him. What misery he caused while his brief reign of glory lasted. But I do want to thank you for what you did. It is something I shall never forget.”

Harriet put in: “He was such a charming young man. We all loved him. What we did for him was so little. If only we could have saved him!”

“My lady, you have earned my eternal gratitude.”

“Well, you must repay us all by taking Enderby Hall and becoming our good neighbour,”

declared Harriet.

“I feel very much inclined to do so.”

“We will all drink a toast to that,” said my father. “Let the goblets be filled.”

So we drank, and in due course Jocelyn’s uncle bought Enderby Hall.

The next two years were, I think, some of the most momentous in English history and I never ceased to marvel at how quietly we lived through those events. Leigh was still in the army, serving under the Earl of Marlborough, whom my father had known in the days when, as John Churchill, he had been a rival of the King’s for Barbara Castlemaine’s favours. Leigh had a great admiration for him as a soldier and there could be no question, at this time, of his leaving the army.

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It soon became obvious that trouble was inevitable, for the King was at variance with so many of his subjects.

The belief in the Divine Right of Kings which had brought his father to the scaffold was there in James, and my father said he could see disaster creeping nearer and nearer. He simply could not believe that he could be turned off the throne, although one would have thought that what had happened to his father would have been a lesson to him. Poor James! He lacked not only his brother’s wit and charm but his common sense.

There was a great deal of talk about the number of Catholics he was appointing to important posts, and when he issued the Declaration for Liberty of Conscience, this was seen as a scheme to establish Papal Supremacy in England.

It was discussed over meals. There would be Thomas Willerby, Gregory and my father all earnestly asking themselves and each other what the outcome would be. Robert Frinton sometimes joined them, and although he came of a Catholic family and would have welcomed freedom for all opinions, he could see that Catholicism would never be accepted in England, for the people had sternly set their faces against it since the reign of Bloody Mary. They still remembered the Smithfield fires when so many Protestants had been burned at the stake. It had happened more than a hundred years before, but the memory remained.

The King should have seen disaster approaching, but blithely he pursued the course, turning his face away from the will of the people; and when the seven bishops, who refused to accept the declaration, were arrested and taken to the Tower, there was a general murmuring throughout the country.

On the day of the trial my mother implored my father not to go to London, and to please her he desisted; but it was against his nature. He was born to fight and to fight recklessly. One would have thought his experiences in the Monmouth Rebellion would have taught him a lesson; but he was the sort of man who would never learn from that kind of experience. When he supported a cause, he did so wholeheartedly.