The Love Child (43 page)

I could never forget it when we were together.”

“I know.”

“I was afraid you would realize there was something … I was afraid it would turn you away from me.”

“Nothing on earth would do that. You were meant for me always.”

I allowed myself to be comforted, but I was still thinking of the pistol in the drawer.

I wanted to tell him, but I knew he would take it away if he knew it was there.

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He was all tenderness now, but he was planning something. I was always afraid of what he would do if he knew.

He must not suffer for this.

I said: “I am so tired, Leigh. I feel exhausted.”

“My dearest,” he answered tenderly, “you have suffered too much but today is going to be the end of it. The secret is out. Your father and I will know what to do.”

I did not ask what.

“Lie down now,” he said. “You need to rest. Shut your eyes. We will talk later.”

I obeyed him. I felt a desperate need to be alone.

“Where are you going, Leigh?” I asked him.

“To see your father. I want to talk to him.”

I nodded and he kissed me.

“You are so tired. Try and sleep a little. Rest, my dearest. You will feel better then.”

I let him go and I lay for a while as the shadows crept into the room.

It seemed very quiet. The quietness before the debacle, I thought.

I roused myself. What was I doing lying there? My father and Leigh were both violent men. They would want to make Beaumont Granville pay for what he had done to me.

They would go to him with whips. They would thrash him within an inch of his life as Leigh had done before. And Carlotta would hate them and refuse to believe what we said of him.

Carlotta was doomed if Beaumont Granville lived.

I had made up my mind. The fact that my father and Leigh now shared the secret made no difference to what I must do.

I rose and put on my cloak. I took the pistol and put it into my pocket. I went down to the stables, saddled my horse and rode over to Enderby Hall.

I reached the house. I saw a light hi one of the rooms. I exulted because he was there.

I felt as though I were in a dream and unknown forces were propelling me forward.

There was only one thing that mattered and that was that I should kill Beaumont Granville.

A voice within me seemed to be repeating over and over again: It is the only way.

I pushed open the door and walked into the house. The hall looked ghostly in the dimness. I felt a great impulse to run away.

I seemed to hear the voice of common sense. Tell her the truth.

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Show her what sort of man he is, and if she will not heed your warning it is for her to reap what she will have sown.

“Go back,” said common sense. “Go back.”

But I could not go back.

I do not know to this day whether I should have fired that shot when it came to the point, whether I had it in me to commit murder. I shall never be sure.

There was not a sound in the house-only an unearthly quietness. I started up the stairs. I must find the room where the light was burning.

I came to the balcony and there he was. He was lying on the floor. Blood was staining his embroidered waistcoat. He was quite still. I took one look at his face and I knew.

I had come too late. Someone had done the deed before me.

I ran out of the house. I took my horse and rode home as fast as I could. It was dark now. The weather had changed sharply and there was a touch of frost in the air.

Overhead the stars were brilliant and there was a slim slice of a moon to add to the brightness.

I kept saying to myself: It’s not real. You imagined it. This has preyed on your mind. You are not yourself.

I had taken one look and fled. Perhaps he had not been dead. Perhaps I had not really seen him there. I had. had the pistol in my hand ready to shoot.

My mind was in such a turmoil that I was not sure what had really happened. I could not remember untethering my horse and riding away.

In my room I sat down and looked at my reflection. I scarcely recognized myself in the wild-eyed, white-faced woman who looked back at me. I was like a stranger out of a dream-not quite real. I began to wonder whether I had really seen him lying there.

Then the impulse came to me to go back and look again, to assure myself that I had not imagined the whole thing. I had worked myself up into a state of intense emotion.

I had planned to murder. Had I really seen him lying there? I kept asking myself, or had it been an illusion, a horrible hallucination conjured up by a tortured mind?

I must go back. I must look again on that dead face. I must make sure that I had really seen what I thought I had.

My need was to act. I could not stay in this room alone. I must be sure. So I went back to the stables, took my horse and rode once more to Enderby Hall.

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I tethered my horse at the entrance to the drive and started forward. The house loomed before me. It seemed to take on a life of its own-leering, sinister.

Come inside, it seemed to be saying. Come inside and face your doom.

I pushed open the door. It was still ajar. I stepped into the hall. How eerie it was with the faint moonlight shining through the windows. There was a terrible silence everywhere. It was as though everything in this house were watching me… waiting.

Horror crawled over me. I had known as soon as I had first entered this house that evil was lurking in it.

Run! Run while there is a chance, a voice within me was saying. Don’t look on that sight again.

But I had to see. I had to assure myself. It had not been a dream. I had seen him lying there. I had seen his elaborate waistcoat stained with blood.

I went to the foot of the stairs and started up. What a silence there was in that house! The silence of death. My footsteps seemed to make a great deal of noise on the wooden stairs.

I had reached the balcony. I stared.

There was nothing there.

But I had seen him! How long ago? How long had it taken me to get home and back?

He had been lying there. I had seen him.

I would not believe I had imagined him. I had looked on his distorted features. I had seen the blood on his clothes.

This was getting more and more like a wild nightmare.

I looked closer. There was a stain on the wooden boards. Blood!

No, I had not been mistaken. I had seen him lying there and someone had taken him away.

I turned and fled down the stairs. I came out into the cold night air. I went to my horse and mounted.

And then I saw it… the flickering light among the trees. Someone was there.

Who? And what was that person doing?

I dismounted. I had to know. I tied up my horse again and I went back through the gate. I did not go into the house but towards the shrubbery, and there, hidden by the bushes, I watched that nickering light.

Someone was there … digging. And I knew that it was a grave which was being dug.

Whoever it was who killed Beaumont Granville was burying his body in a grave.

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I was filled with a terrible fear. I leaned against a bush. I must not be seen. I said to myself: Don’t look. You know.

I stood there and covered my face with my hands.

I had betrayed my secret. I had kept it for so long because I had always feared what might happen if the events of that terrible night were known. I had feared just this.

I should never have told.

I recognized the digger. Of course I recognized him. Did I not know him as well as I knew anyone?

I saw Leigh’s face clearly in the moonlight and felt an impulse to go to him.

But something stopped me. No, if the body were carefully buried, if all trace of the murder were removed, it might be that no one would discover that Beaumont Granville had been murdered at Enderby Hall.

I went back to the house. I mounted and rode away.

When I reached Eversleigh Court I was in a state of exhaustion. I went to my room and fell onto my bed.

After a while my mother came in.

“My dear Priscilla, you look ill,” she said. “What is the matter?”

“I have a dreadful headache,” I told her. “I just want to be quiet and lie in the dark.”

“What a pity. It was going to be such a happy homecoming for Leigh. Where is he?

I thought you and he were together. I shall have to put dinner back.”

“I shan’t come down tonight,” I told her. “I feel too ill.”

“We shall have to have the feasting tomorrow, and if you are not better I shall call the doctor in to see you.”

“Oh, dear Mother,” I said, “I am so sorry.”

She kissed me. “It’s nothing, dear child. There is tomorrow. It will be all right then. I’ll leave you now to rest.”

I lay in the darkness. Then I got up and undressed. I must pretend to be asleep because I could not speak to anybody yet.

It was nearly two hours later when Leigh came in.

He came quietly and I pretended to be asleep. He came to the bed, holding a lighted candle and looking down at me. I kept my eyes shut and when he turned away I opened them. I saw his muddied clothes and I felt sick with fear.

He was a long time washing the mud from himself.

That night we lay side by side. I had not spoken to him since his return, pretending to be in a deep sleep. He did not seem to want to speak either. We lay side by side through the night, feigning sleep, but I was aware of his wakef ulness.

278The Revelation

Looking back, I cannot think how I lived through the next few weeks. The memory of Beaumont Granville was always with us.

The next day I had gone out to that spot where I had seen Leigh among the trees.

It was clear that the earth had been disturbed and I knew that the body of Beaumont Granville was lying underneath it.

I was almost beside myself with grief and anxiety. Somehow I had always known that that night which I had spent with him had not been the end. It was only the opening of a hideous tragedy. It was like a macabre masque and this was the inevitable ending.

The affair at Venice had been the prelude. The attempted abduction and the thrashing had set the stage for what was to come.

Leigh was a murderer because of what I had done. I had always known that he would kill Beaumont Granville if he learned what had happened. His nature was one of impulsive passion. When he had heard what had happened, he had planned to kill him and he had done so without delay. Then he had dug his grave and buried him.

Murder is a fearsome thing. I suppose anyone who has committed it can never forget it. I had come near to committing it myself. But should I have fired the fatal shot when I had come face to face with my tormentor? I began to wonder. Instinct told me that I would never have done it. I could never have killed another human being 279

whatever the provocation. But I could almost wish that I had done it myself rather than that Leigh should.

It had been my tragedy. I had made the decision to save my father’s life. I should have been the one who took that last action.

But I could never have done it. I realized that now.

And now what was next? I was sure it was not finished.

For a whole week nothing happened. Leigh and I were like strangers. We could not even make an attempt at leading a normal married life.

He seemed as though he did not want to come near me, and yet I was aware that he was yearning for me. I took refuge in illness. It was not difficult.

My mother sent for the doctor, who said I needed to eat more. I was exhausted. I must rest and eat nourishing food, or I might go into a decline.

Carlotta came to see me. I believe she had to be persuaded to do so. She was aloof and sullen.

Harriet came. “What on earth has happened to you?” she demanded. “You are so wan.

You haven’t been yourself for a long time. What is it?”

I repeated what the doctor had said.

“Carlotta is disturbed,” she said. “She hasn’t heard from our romantic hero for some tune.”

“Oh?” I said faintly.

“No. Apparently he had been at Enderby and he has just disappeared.”

“At Enderby!” I said blankly.

“Yes. The empty house. It’s hers, of course, and it seems he went there so that he would be near and she could go and see him. Then one day … he’s gone. She thought he had to go to London and didn’t have time to tell her. She’s anxious now to go to London.”

I said nothing.

“She’s determined to marry him,” went on Harriet. “I expect she will. Once she’s made up her mind she doesn’t rest until she gets what she wants. You’ll have to get reconciled, Priscilla.”

I turned my head away listlessly.

“Well,” said Harriet, “it’s life. If he’s a bit of a rogue she’ll get used to it.

The young have to live for themselves, you know. No use trying to set them on the straight and narrow path before they have explored the byways.”

I wanted to shout at her: Go away. I can’t bear any more.

Christabel came to see me. She soothed me because she did not I

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talk about Beaumont Granville but herself. She wanted another child. She thought she ought to have one. She knew it was what Thomas wanted more than anything.

“I thought you were supposed not to,” I said.

“It would be dangerous, they said. But I think young Thomas needs a brother or sister.”

“Don’t be silly,” I admonished, “he needs you more.”

“I suppose so,” she answered. “It was a miracle, wasn’t it, the way I became so important to my two Thomases? … I who had never been important to anyone before and only a nuisance to some.”

“You always did talk a lot of nonsense about that, Christabel.”

A few weeks later she came to me and told me she was pregnant.

“It will all work out for the best,” she said. “I know I am doing the right thing.”

My mother said it was foolish in view of what had happened at the time of young Thomas’s birth. Thomas Willerby was very worried; but there was an air of serenity about Christabel, and she kept insisting that this would make everything right.