The Ugly Sister (37 page)

‘Yes, ma'am.'

After dinner, which proceeded without interruption, I took the girls upstairs again. There was so much damp in the attic – inevitable it seemed in Cornwall even in an otherwise dry house. Every metal surface was rusty, whether it was scissors, curling tongs, leather punches or hairpins. We found baby clothes, a child's potty with stains in the bottom.

‘Look 'ere, miss,' Fetch said.

They had opened a larger box in a corner by the chimney breast, and she had taken out a child's tartan suit in green and red. The trousers suggested it had been made for a boy of five or six. There was a strong smell of mothballs, and although the suit was well worn it had been carefully packed in pink tissue paper. So …

‘And then there's this, ma'am,' said Ethel, holding up a child's frock. It had a small white nankeen jacket over a white lace bodice and a short velveteen skirt. Also well worn but neatly packed.

So had there been two children, and if so had they died or merely grown too big to wear these clothes? There was no reason to suspect the worst. Someday in the future I would ride over and make the acquaintance of Miss Betsy Slocombe. I thought I would like her.

That was, if I had a future.

The women were getting tired by now, and I had no real excuse to keep them up there any longer. They were at present poring over some children's sketching books which had come out of the bottom drawer of the bureau. Nothing had yet been thrown away, but things had been dropped to one side of a rough demarcation line implying what ought to go and what might be kept.

‘All right,' I said. ‘ That will do for today. We'll finish off tomorrow.'

They clattered down the uncarpeted stairs behind me and then moved silently on the furnished landing.

I went into the kitchen. Cannon got quickly to his feet. Mousie, who had been excluded from the attic, rose mewing and stretching towards me. I said to Mrs Bluett: ‘I'll have supper in the back room tonight. Cannon.'

‘Ma'am?'

‘I want to give the appearance of having gone away. Will you close the shutters in the front rooms and draw the curtains in the bedrooms. That means that when darkness falls lamps need not be lit.'

‘Very good, ma'am.'

‘No one has been, I presume?'

‘Well one man, yes ma'am, about 'alf an hour gone. What name was it? Street?'

‘I saw no one.'

‘He come to the back door, which was where he looked as if he belonged.'

‘Slade,' said Mrs Bluett. ‘
Mister
Slade, he called his self.'

‘What did he want?'

‘'E asked for you, ma'am. Then he asked if Mr Abraham Fox was 'ere. I said no to both.'

‘Did that satisfy him?'

‘I dunno, ma'am. I think 'e was half drunk. He just went off down the path limping and grumbling. I didn't know you knew 'im, ma'am. Did I do right?'

‘Yes, of course.' I went out.

It was hours to darkness yet. Nothing had happened. Why should I feel in my bones that something might yet happen? Bram, if he had any sense, particularly a sense of self-preservation, would surely by now be packing his things and preparing to leave the county. Or had I misjudged him? Surely not. Could he brazen it out? He came of an influential family.

Was he a man ever to run? I did not know. Was he wise enough to know when he was beaten?

I had lentil soup for supper, with a cold capon and damson tart to follow. The food seemed to stick in my mouth and refuse to be swallowed; but I dallied over it, for there was nothing more to do with the day. I felt safer with Cannon's presence in the house. He usually slept over the stables but I must tell him to stay in the house tonight.

Fetch. ‘If you please, miss, Mrs Bluett says she has a bad headache and can she be excused?'

‘Of course. And tell Ethel she can clear these things.'

‘You ' aven't ate much,' said Fetch, peering.

‘It's enough.'

Mrs Bluett was someone who ought to have been discharged. She had these headaches at regular intervals and it was rumoured they were caused by drinking. No doubt my porter or my brandy. She wasn't even a very good cook. Under Uncle Francis's promptings I had become very much better than that. But I had lacked the impulse or severity which was needed to make a change. She was the only one who had ‘come with the house' and there had always seemed more important decisions to make.

I had not slept for thirty-six hours, and as the tension relaxed my eyes ached and wanted to close. Yet I knew if I once shut them the wires would tauten again, and a rush of thought and nervous emotion would break in and make sleep impossible. I would have given a lot for some of that laudanum syrup which had been so helpful in Berlin.

At eight I told Cannon that I would like him to spend the night in the house. There was a small bedroom overlooking the front door and I asked him to use that. By now the sun was setting. There had been cloud later in the day but this had broken again and shafts of sunlight lanced through the trees. In twenty minutes or so it would be gone and the long twilight would begin. There was no moon tonight, so after about nine-thirty it would be dark.

I went into the back sitting room and began to read. In spite of all Uncle Francis's efforts I have never felt deeply stirred by religion, but tonight I picked up the bible he gave me for my twentieth birthday and turned the pages. Now if ever I needed strength and comfort.

‘Oh, my dove, thou art in the clefts of the rock, in the secret places of the stairs, let me see thy countenance, let me hear thy voice, for sweet is thy voice and thy countenance is comely.

‘Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines, for our vines have tender grapes.

‘By night on my bed I sought him whom my soul loveth; I sought him but I found him not …

‘I am come into my garden, my sister, my spouse … I sleep but my heart waketh: it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love … I opened to my beloved and my hands dropped with myrrh … My beloved had withdrawn himself and was gone: my soul failed when he spake; I sought him but I could not find him; I called him but he gave me no answer …'

A loud banging. I woke with a start. So I had dozed after all. For how long? I got up and parted the curtains and saw it was nearly dusk. Was that banging in my head?

Or was it Fetch at the door?

‘Beg pardon, miss, but it's Mr Fox.'

My heart lurched. ‘
What? Where?
'

‘At the front door. Cannon told him you was away, but though he shut the door in his face he came back like this, bangin' and bangin'.'

I had swallowed the remnants of a bad dream and wakened to a worse one. The house was silent now.

I picked up the bible and put it on a side table. ‘He will go away.'

As if directly to contradict this the banging on the door began again. And shouting.

I went into the hall. Cannon was standing by the front door. He was about to speak but I put a finger to my lips. Ethel and one of the other maids were by the green baize door to the kitchen.

I stole to the front door. Something splintered. It was not the door but something he was using on it outside.

‘Emma!' he shouted. ‘Emma! I know you're there, damn you! Let me in!'

‘There's a weak shutter in the dining room,' Cannon whispered. ‘I 'ope he don't know of that!'

‘Emma!' came his voice. ‘I know you're in there! I'll get you out sooner or later, so you might as well come
now
!'

I looked at Cannon. He was of sturdy build, but his face had lost its usual colour. If the thought had ever entered my head that I might some day need a bodyguard I would have chosen someone taller and younger.

Everybody waited, listening to a scraping outside.

‘Whatever's to do?' came a complaining voice from the kitchen. Mrs Bluett appeared, night-railed, wrapped in a shawl. ‘ Oh, beg pardon, ma'am, I didn't see you was ' ere. What's to do?'

‘Be quiet!' I said in a low voice.

She turned to Ethel and muttered something about being waked from her first sleep and her head was something chronic. Her looks confirmed the suspicion that she was on a drinking bout.

The voice outside suggested that someone else had been on a drinking bout. Bram drank above average always, but I had never seen him drunk. Was this the first time? Nor had I ever seen his temper at its worst. He had reason to be angry after receiving the letter. His life was in ruins.

Now the banging began again. It sounded much heavier as if this time instead of wood he had found a rock or a piece of stone. Mrs Bluett put her hands to her ears and retreated unsteadily into the kitchen.

Fetch said in my ear, ‘Farmer Eames will hear this! Surely he'll come over to see what is amiss.'

‘Bring a lamp,' I said. ‘It must be nearly dark outside.'

The door was shaking and rattling with the assault on it. It was of good oak, but would not withstand this for ever.

Then it all suddenly ceased. Fetch brought a light from the kitchen. I wondered if, as Cannon feared, the wild man outside would transfer his assault to one of the shuttered windows.

Then a quiet voice said, ‘Emma.'

He must have been speaking through the keyhole, for it sounded so terribly close, so intimate.

‘I know you're there because your little kitten has come out to greet me. He's not afraid of me, are you, Mousie? Kiddy, kiddy, kiddy, what a fine little kiddy.'

I looked wildly around. Glances flew between us. No one spoke. Then Ethel whispered: ‘ She went out about 'alf an hour gone.'

I choked and said nothing.

Then Bram went on: ‘ I know you're there now, Emma, because you can't bear to part with your little baby, and if you had gone away you would have taken her with you.'

I gripped the back of a chair for support.

He said: ‘I don't want to make any more disturbance for I might frighten little Mousie, and that would be too bad, wouldn't it, kiddy?'

Of the three other people in the hall, none would meet my eyes.

Then he said: ‘Come out and walk in the garden. We can talk like ordinary human beings. You've made so many false assumptions in your letter that it would be only fair to hear what I have to say in my own defence.'

I hesitated. ‘Don't go, miss,' whispered Fetch, her hands to her mouth. ‘ Don't trust ' im.'

Sickness was coming and going in waves. I sat in the chair and did not speak. Minutes passed in silence.

Then he said: ‘You're so contrary, Emma, I could wring your neck. D'you know that? All I'm asking is for a walk in the garden.
Your
garden. Just let us talk it over. Just let us talk it out.'

I held onto the arm of the chair, opened my mouth to reply, then said nothing. A clock was striking nine.

‘Or,' he said, ‘if I have to do it I'll wring your little kitten's blasted neck instead. Would you like that? If I have to go away I shall leave little Mousie hanging upside down on your door handle. I've got her in my hands now. She's as friendly as you please. Just as friendly as I want you to be.'

‘He wouldn't
dare
!' said Fetch. ‘Not even 'e wouldn't dare!'

‘You'll hear the squawk,' he said.

I got up, went to the door. ‘ Open it,' I said to Cannon and when he hesitated screamed at him:

‘
Open it!
'

He began to pull the bolts back. They creaked and grunted.

‘Let me come with ' ee,' hissed Fetch.

‘No.'

The door swung open. Outside it was nearly dark. The light from the hall showed him standing there holding the kitten. His coat was off and his cravat was loose. He laughed at the sight of me, all the old devil in his eyes, hair falling loosely across his forehead.

‘So there you are, my little Emma, eh? Coming for a little walk? Come along then.' He released Mousie, who landed sure-footedly and fled into the house. ‘Think I would have hurt your damned cat? Never! I know you could never love me if I did.' He laughed again as at a great joke.

‘Bram,' I said, trembling all over, ‘I think you had better come in. I don't want to walk anywhere with you.'

‘Anything you say, dear heart …' He stopped and turned at the sound of footsteps on the gravel. He stopped laughing and his eyes changed.

There was a tremendous explosion beside my ear, and a great black stain suddenly showed on Bram's shirt. In seconds the black turned to red and he was lying half in and half out of the porch, his eyes open, blinking, gasping, wandering.

I was on my knees beside him. He put up a hand but it fell back.

‘Slade,' he said, and choked on blood. ‘It was Slade.'

Cannon and Fetch had gone into the garden, staring after a retreating figure.

‘Bram,' I said. ‘We must – must get a doctor.'

‘It was all a trap – wasn't it,' he said. ‘You invited him here – knew I would come—'

‘Oh, my God!' I screamed. ‘That is not true! Do you think I could wish this? A trap! The only one I was trying to escape from was the one you set for me!'

Cannon back. ‘' E's gone. Can't see nothing of 'im. There's a musket lying in the shrubbery. He must 'f thrown it as 'e ran!'

‘Help me!' I cried. ‘ Help me, Fetch, I must get Mr Fox indoors out of the chill. Cannon, run for Dr Harris.'

We dragged him into the hall. I clawed at a cushion to put under his head, flew into the kitchen for a towel to stem the blood.

‘Water!' I said to Ethel. ‘ Get hot water and a basin.'

Back with him, he looked up at me quizzically. ‘Can't breathe.' He coughed, and a blister of blood showed on his lips.

With a knife I cut at his shirt, pulled it back. Red hole, oozing, torn at edges; press the linen towel against it. His eyes glazed over again. Fetch came with a blanket. ‘Cannon has taken the 'orse, miss. ' Tis quicker.'