I BEGAN TO FEEL unwell. The months of waiting seemed longer than they had when I was awaiting the birth of Priscilla. I think I was obsessed by the fear that I might not have a son.
That made me resentful towards Carleton. It was so stupid to blame a woman because the sex of her child was not what her husband hoped for. Kings had done it in the past. I thought of Anne Boleyn and all that had happened through her failing to get a son and how she must have felt during the long waiting months, the outcome of which would decide her future. The reverberations of that affair had affected my ancestress Damask Farland and her family. It was unfair, so arrogant, so typical of a certain kind of man. Henry VIII’s kind. Carleton’s kind.
Our own King Charles could not get a legitimate son, although he had several boy bastards. I wondered how his gentle Queen felt about her inadequacy. Perhaps she was not so anxious as I was. Charles might be a blatantly unfaithful husband but by all accounts he was a kindly one.
It was a hot summer’s day when it happened. I had four more months to go before the expected birth of my child and I was in the garden with Priscilla. I could hear the boys at the shooting butts just behind the lawn. Every now and then I would hear a shot, then a whoop of delight or perhaps a groan. They were happy. That much was certain. Edwin was really enjoying the discipline imposed by Carleton and I was rather gratified to notice that he had a great respect for him. He did not love him; he was too much in awe of him for that, but he certainly looked up to him with a kind of reverence. I was pleased at this, and I knew Carleton relished it. I hoped it would make them feel closer together.
I was thinking of this and had not noticed that Priscilla had toddled away. She had an exploring nature and was constantly attempting to evade supervision. Looking up suddenly I saw to my horror that she was making towards the shooting butts.
Horrified, I sprang up and ran towards her, calling her name. She seemed to think it was some sort of game, for she increased her speed. I could hear her chuckling to herself. Then I caught the heel of my shoe in a gnarled root and fell.
I was panic-stricken and in sudden pain. I called, “Priscilla, Priscilla,” and tried hard to rise. “Come back. Come back.”
I stood up and fell again.
Then I saw Carleton coming towards me. He was carrying Priscilla.
When he saw me, he put her down and ran towards me.
“What happened?”
“I was afraid … She was running towards the butts. I … I fell.”
He lifted me up in his arms and carried me into the house.
I heard him shout to one of the servants: “Send for the doctor … at once.”
I lay on my bed. The room was darkened, for they had drawn the curtains across them to shut out the light. I was tired and dispirited though the pain had passed.
I believe I had been very ill.
Sally Nullens came into the room.
“Ah, awake then.” She was standing over me with the inevitable bowl of broth.
“Oh, Sally,” I said.
“You’ll be all right, mistress,” she said. “My word, Master Edwin has been in a fine state. I’ve not been able to quieten him. I can tell him now, though, that you’re on the mend.”
“I’ve lost the baby,” I said.
“There’ll be other babies,” she answered. “Praise God, we didn’t lose you.”
“Was I so bad, then?”
“Don’t do you much good talking. Take this. It’ll put life into you.”
So I took it. She watched me. She said: “I’ll bring them in to see you before they go to bed. The three of them. I’ve promised them, you see.”
She brought them in. Edwin flew at me and hugged me so tightly that Sally protested.
“Do you want to strangle your mama, young man?”
Leigh tried to push him aside. “Me too,” he said.
Priscilla was crying because she was being left out.
I smiled happily at them.
Whatever happened I had them.
Carleton came and sat by my bed. Poor Carleton, how disappointed he was!
“I’m sorry,” I said stretching out a hand. He took it and kissed it.
“Never mind, Arabella. There’ll be another time.”
“There must be. I shall not rest until you have your son.”
“There has to be a rest after this … a year at least, they tell me. Perhaps two.”
“You mean before we have a child?”
He nodded.
“At least,” he said, “you’ve come through. You’ve been very ill, you know. If only you hadn’t … But what’s the good?”
“I was terrified.”
“I know. Priscilla!” He said the name almost angrily.
“I thought she would get into the shooting range and …”
“Don’t fret about it. She didn’t. In any case I should have seen her and stopped the firing.”
“Oh, Carleton, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t say it like that. As though I’m some … monster …”
“You are,” I said with a return of my old spirit.
He bent down and kissed me. “Get well, quickly, Arabella,” he murmured.
Matilda came.
“Oh, my dear, dear child, how wonderful that you can now have visitors. I have been beside myself with fear. It was so dreadful … my dear husband, Toby … and then you. It was as though there was some evil spell on the house. …”
She stopped. I noticed that Sally was in the room.
“It was just an unfortunate chain of circumstances,” I said. “Let’s hope this is the end of our troubles.”
“It must be because you are well again. Sally tells me that you are picking up very quickly. That’s so, eh, Sally?”
“I know how to treat her, milady. I’m going to have her on her feet before the week’s out. You’ll see. …”
“I’ve always trusted you, Sally. Ah, Charlotte.”
Charlotte had come into the room.
“Charlotte, see how well Arabella is looking,” went on Matilda. “Almost her old self, don’t you think?”
“You look much better,” said Charlotte. “I am so glad and very sorry that it happened.”
“It was an unfortunate accident.” I said. “I should have been more careful.”
“Yes,” said Charlotte quietly.
“Do sit down, Charlotte,” said her mother. “You look so awkward standing there.”
Charlotte meekly sat and we talked for a while of the children. Poor Edwin had been heartbroken. Having been introduced to death through his grandfather and Uncle Toby, he had feared that I was going to die.
“It was hard to comfort him,” said Charlotte. “Leigh could do it better than anyone. How close those two boys have become.”
We talked of Priscilla and how bright she was. She too had missed me and kept saying my name and crying for me.
“So you see how glad everyone is that you are getting well,” said Matilda.
Then Sally came and said that I ought not to tire myself and she thought I had talked enough for a while.
So they went out and left me alone with my thoughts. I could not stop thinking of Carleton’s disappointment, and I wondered how deeply he blamed me … and perhaps Priscilla … for what had happened.
It was two days later when Harriet came to see me. I was much stronger then, sitting up and even taking an occasional walk round the room.
“We must not go too fast,” Sally ordered, and she was undoubtedly mistress of the sickroom.
I had insisted that she take a rest that afternoon, for I knew how tired nursing me made her, for she insisted on keeping her eye on the children as well, and she was lying down. I guess that that was why Harriet had chosen this time to come.
She tiptoed into the room, her lovely eyes alight with a kind of mischief.
“The dragon is sleeping,” she said in a dramatic voice. “Do you know she has been breathing fire at me every time I approached.”
“So you came before?”
“Of course I came. You don’t think I would stay away when you were ill, do you?”
Her presence made me feel alive again. She exuded vitality. I was pleased to see her.
“You don’t look as though you’re dying,” she said.
“I am not,” I answered.
“You had us all very worried, I can tell you.”
“I feel so angry with myself. After all that waiting … it is gone.”
“You mustn’t fret. That’s bad for you. You must be thankful that you were not taken away from your beloved family. Edwin was distrait.”
“I know, they told me. He is a dear boy.”
“So devoted to his mama and so he should be. So should we all. Arabella … I haven’t told anyone yet. I want you to be the first to know. It’s wonderful really. It’s made me feel happy again. I did love Toby. I know you doubted my feelings. You’ve never really forgiven me for Edwin, have you?”
“Oh, that … It’s so long ago.”
“I know your nature. You forgive but you can’t forget. You’ll never quite trust me again, will you?”
“Perhaps not.”
“I’m going to make you. I’m so fond of you, Arabella. That makes you smile. You think I couldn’t do what I did and be fond of you. I could. What happened between me and Edwin was outside friendship. Those things always are. The attraction arises quite suddenly sometimes and it’s irresistible. One forgets everything but the need to satisfy it. When it’s over, the rest of one’s life slips back into shape and it’s just as it was before. …”
I shook my head. “Let’s not discuss it. We shall never agree.”
“I was brought up so differently from you, Arabella. I always had to fight. It’s become natural with me. I fight for what I want and take it and then consider the cost. But I didn’t come to say all this. It’s just that when I’m with you, I feel I have to justify myself. Arabella, I am going to have a child.”
“Harriet! Is that possible?”
“Obviously. Toby wasn’t all that old, you know.”
“I can see you’re happy.”
“It’s what I need. Don’t you see? You, of all people. Didn’t it happen to you? Think back. Your husband died suddenly and afterwards you found you were going to have a child. That is how it is with me. Come, rejoice with me. I feel like singing the Magnificat.”
“When …?”
“Six months from now.”
She came to me and put her arms round me. “It makes all the difference. I shall stay here. I have a right to now. I had before, but a double right now. Old Matilda was hoping I’d go. So was Charlotte, and as for your Sally, she looks at me as though I’m the Devil incarnate. But I don’t care. I’m going to have a child. A little Eversleigh. Think of that. My own child.”
“You won’t go away and leave this one, I hope,” I said coolly, but I was beginning to succumb to the old charm.
She laughed. “Your tongue’s getting sharp again, Arabella. You get so much practice with Carleton.”
“Is it so noticeable?”
“Perhaps. But no doubt he enjoys it. Now about this baby …”
“You say you haven’t told anyone?”
“I was determined that you should be the first.”
“If only Uncle Toby had known, how delighted he would have been.”
Her eyes were a trifle misty. “Dear Toby,” she said. I was moved, and then I wondered if she was still playing a part.
The news of Harriet’s expectations astounded the household, and for a few days it was whispered that she must have imagined this was so. But as the weeks passed it became obvious that she was not mistaken.
She was quite smug, and clearly enjoying her position. She behaved as though it was a great joke and in some way she had scored over us all.
Carleton was shaken. I could see that.
“If this is a boy,” he said, “he will be next in line to Edwin.”
“Not when Edwin marries and has a son of his own.”
“A good many years will have to pass before that.”
“I wish you would stop talking of Edwin as though his days are numbered.”
“Sorry. I was merely thinking …”
“Of the line of succession. Really one would think Eversleigh was the throne.”
He brooded on it, I know. I often saw him watch Harriet with an odd speculation in his eyes.
There was a good deal of friction between us. Life had not been smooth since my miscarriage. He seemed resentful of my love for Priscilla and of course Edwin. Although I could understand a certain jealously of Edwin, it seemed incredible that a man could blame his own daughter because of the loss of a possible son.
Carleton was unnatural, I told him. He was obsessed by his desire for a son. I knew, I said, that this was a common desire among a certain type of man but Carleton carried it to extreme. He was away a good deal. He went to Whitehall and I knew was prominent in Court circles. I often wondered about his life there. I used to worry about the weakening of our feelings for each other and I told myself it was inevitable. I knew I was in some ways to blame, and yet I longed for him to come back and to be to me what he had been in the beginning. But had he really been as I imagined him? There had been a violent passion between us, but was that the foundation on which to build a lifetime’s happiness? Perhaps I was wrong. I had always harked back to that glorious time with Edwin—which had been entirely false. Because of it I had been determined not be duped again. Had that made me hard, suspicious?
Life seemed to have become unreal during the months that followed. Harriet was the only one who was content. She went about hugging her secret joy, and in the way I remembered so well she began to dominate the household.
She would get us all together to sing ballads in the evening—myself, Charlotte, Gregory Stevens and often Matthew Dollan, who was constantly riding over. Charlotte was aloof with him, as though she knew that I hoped they might be attracted and was determined to foil me.
Harriet would tell stories of her life as a player and her audience would be tense with excitement. She certainly was a true Scheherazade, for she had a trick of stopping at an exciting point and saying: “No more now. My voice is going. I have to protect it, you know.”
Edwin and Leigh would creep in and listen. They thought her enchanting and she made a special point of charming them. Even Priscilla would toddle up and watch her wonderingly while she sang or talked.
Anxious as I was about my relationship with Carleton, saddened by the fact that I was not the one who was expecting a child, I allowed myself to be drawn into her spell and I would find myself excited by her as the others were.
Through the winter months she grew larger but nonetheless beautiful. There was a wonderful serenity about her which added to her beauty.
Even Sally Nullens was excited by the prospect of a new baby in the nursery.
I said to her one day: “Sally, you’re longing for this baby, I know.”
“Oh I can never resist them,” she admitted. “There’s nothing as beautiful as a helpless little baby to my mind.”
“Even Harriet’s?” I said.
“Whatever else she is,” answered Sally, “she’s a mother.”
I had not noticed that Charlotte had come into the room. She was so self-effacing. She seemed to want not to be noticed.
“Do you think she will have an easy confinement?” I asked.
“Her!” cried Sally, her eyes flashing suddenly. “With her it will be like shelling peas. It is with her sort. …”
“Her sort …” I said.
“There’s something about her,” said Sally quietly. “I’ve always known it. They say witches have special powers.”
“Sally, you’re not suggesting Harriet is a witch?” murmured Charlotte.
Sally said: “I’m saying nothing.”
“You just have,” I reminded her.
“I can only say what I feel. There’s something … some special powers … I don’t know what it is. Some call it witchcraft. I don’t like it and I never will.”
“Oh, Sally, what nonsense. She’s just a healthy and attractive woman …”
“Who knows how to get what she wants.”
Charlotte and I exchanged glances which implied that we shouldn’t take old Sally too seriously.
It was February when Harriet gave birth to her child, and as Sally had predicted it was an easy birth. She had a son and I must admit I felt a twinge of envy.
It was a week or so after the birth of the child, whom she had christened Benjamin, when Carleton came home.
He embraced me warmly and I felt a sudden thrill of happiness. I determined that in time, when I had recovered from this lassitude which had been with me since my miscarriage, I also would have a son.
Carleton noticed at once. “You’re better,” he said. And swung me up and held me against him.
“I’m glad you are home,” I said.
We walked into the house arm in arm. I said to him: “We have an addition to the household. Harriet’s child has arrived.”
He was silent for a moment and I went on: “It’s a son. Trust Harriet to have a son.”
“Yes,” he said slowly, “trust Harriet.”
I went with him to her room to see him. She was in bed; her Benjie was in his cradle and Sally hovered.
Harriet held out her hand to Carleton. He took it and it seemed to me that he held it for a long time.
She withdrew it and said: “Sally, give me Benjie. I want to show him off. I tell you this, Carleton, he is the most beautiful baby in the world. Sally will bear me out.”
She sat there. How beautiful she was, with her magnificent hair falling about her shoulders, her face serenely happy, her lovely eyes soft as I had rarely seen them.
I was deeply aware of Carleton. He was watching her intently. I thought again it was like one of those tableaux, full of meaning.
Benjie thrived. Sally said she had never seen a baby with a finer pair of lungs. When he bellowed, Priscilla watched him in wonder. He showed a determination to get what he wanted from his earliest days. He was beautiful with big blue eyes and dark tufts of hair. Priscilla liked to stand and watch Sally bathe him and to hand her the towels.
I had never seen Harriet so contented before. Her maternal instincts surprised me, but I told myself cynically that she loved her baby partly because he consolidated her position here. Of course as Toby’s widow she had a right to be in the house, but the fact that she had borne one of the heirs to lands and title made her position doubly assured.
But even so I was aware of growing tension all about me. I fancied that Harriet was alert, that she was engaged in some secret adventures. Perhaps it was my imagination, I told myself. Perhaps I could never really forget.
I sometimes wandered to the edge of the gardens to the arbour in which Edwin had died. It was such a gloomy place, and the shrubs about it were becoming more overgrown than ever. It looked eerie, ghostly, as the scene of a tragedy can become when people hate to go there and build up legends about it.
Chastity had let out that the servants said it was haunted. Haunted, I thought, by Edwin. Edwin who had been cut off suddenly with his sins upon him, caught in the act by Old Jethro the reformer. I wondered what Harriet felt when she went past it. She had participated in that death scene and must remember, but she never said anything when the arbour was mentioned. Harriet, I believed, was the sort of woman who in an adventuring life put unpleasant events right out of her memory.
For the last few months there had been complaints about the pigeons and the damage they were doing to the fabric of Eversleigh Court, and the grooms and menservants were constantly taking potshots at them. Ellen said that everyone in the neighbourhood was getting tired of pigeon pie and pigeon stews, or roast pigeon and pigeon cooked in pots.
“I tell them,” she said, “they should be glad of good food whatever it is.”
Carleton had said the boys might shoot at them. A moving target would give them good practice. I often heard them boasting together of the number they had shot. Then they would take them along to the cottage people.
It was one summer day. I was in the garden picking roses and I thought suddenly of another occasion when I had been similarly engaged and when Carleton had come upon me there and how we had talked and bantered and he had asked me to marry him.
The scene of the roses brought back memories of that day vividly and the excitement I felt even though I had pretended not to want him. Then I went on to think of our marriage and the sudden awakening of what was new and exciting in our relationship. What had happened to that now? Perhaps it was impossible to keep passion at such fever heat. Perhaps there had been nothing deeper than that. I kept comparing my relationship with Carleton to that which I had shared with Edwin. How romantic my first marriage had seemed, how perfect! And how foolish of me to think it was so! It has been a sham from the beginning. And yet I could not forget it. It had done something to me. People were affected by experiences, naturally. They became warped and suspicious. That was how I had become with Carleton.
The scent of roses, the heat of the sun on my hands, the buzzing of bees, and memories carried on the warm summer air … and then suddenly … it happened. I was not sure what it was. Except that I fell towards the rosebush and the sky began to recede further and further away. I had put my hand to my sleeve and touched something warm and sticky … I was aware of looking at my hands … They were as red as the roses in my basket. I was lying against the rosebush, slipping silently into the grass. It seemed to take a long time and then there was nothing.
I was in someone’s arms being carried. Carleton. I heard a child’s voice screaming: “I didn’t do it. I didn’t. I didn’t.” Vaguely I thought: That is Leigh. Then a voice—Jasper’s. “You godless imp. You’ve killed the mistress.”
After that the darkness was complete.
I was aware of Carleton all the time. Carleton talking, Carleton bending over me, Carleton angry. “How could this have happened? By God, I’m going to find out …” Carleton tender. “Arabella, my darling, darling Arabella …”
And awakening suddenly, a small figure at my bedside. “I didn’t do it. I didn’t. I didn’t. It came right over my head. It did. It did.”
The light was dim. I opened my eyes.
“Leigh,” I said. “Little Leigh?”
A hot hand seeking my free one. I seemed to have lost the other.
“I didn’t do it. I didn’t. I didn’t.”
Then: “Come away, Leigh.” That was Sally’s voice, gentle, understanding. “She knows you didn’t.”
“Leigh,” I said. “I know.”
Sally said softly: “Poor mite. Brokenhearted he is. They think it was him taking potshots at the pigeons.”
I knew then that I had been shot. As I had put up my hand to pluck the red roses the pellets had entered my arm.
The doctor had removed the pellets. They had been deeply imbedded it seemed, and that was why I had been so ill.
It was a blessing, they said, that they had struck me in the arm.
Carleton was often at my bedside and I felt a great comfort to see him there.
It was three days before he told me. Then I had recovered from the fever which the operation of taking the pellets away had caused.
“I shall never forget it,” he said. “Leigh screaming and running and seeing you there on the grass. I was ready to kill the stupid boy … but I have my doubts now. Do you remember what happened?”
“No. I was picking roses. It was warm and sunny and now and then I heard the sound of shooting. There is nothing exceptional about that. Then it happened. … I didn’t know what it was at first. I heard the shouting and I realized there was blood …”
“So you saw no one?”
“No one at all.”
“Not before you started picking the roses?”
“No. I don’t remember.”
Carleton was silent. “I’ve been very worried, Arabella.”
“Oh, Carleton. I’m glad. I’m so glad you care enough to be worried.”
“Care enough! What are you talking about? Aren’t you my wife? Aren’t I your loving husband?”
“My husband, yes. Loving … I’m not sure …”
“Things have been difficult lately, I know. I expect it’s my fault. All that fuss about the child we lost … as though it was your fault.”
“I understand your disappointment, Carleton. I’ve been touchy, anxious, I suppose, disappointed in myself for having disappointed you.”
“Foolish pair! We have so much. It makes one realize it when one comes near to losing it.”
He bent over me and kissed me. “Get well quickly, Arabella. Be your old self. Flash your eyes, scorn me, lash me with your tongue. … Make it like it used to be. That’s what I want.”
“Have I been too gentle?”
“Aloof,” he said, “as though there is something keeping us apart. There isn’t, is there?”
“Nothing that I have put there.”
“Then there is nothing.”
I was content while he sat by my bed. I was longing to be well again and I was determined to bring about that happy state.
He said: “I was so worried about that shot. I have to find out where it came from. The boy was so insistent. I don’t think he could be lying. He’s a brave little fellow. Not afraid to own up when he’s done wrong. He was so insistent. He was there alone. He is a good shot and I had given my permission for them to shoot the pigeons. He was doing nothing wrong. He said he wasn’t shooting in your direction at all. There weren’t any pigeons there. They were fluttering down from the roof. He said the shot went right over his head, to you, and it occurred to me that someone might have been hiding there in the bushes at the side of the house.”
“Someone hiding to shoot me. Why?”
“That’s what I wanted to find out. That’s what bothers me. I had an idea, and I went to see Young Jethro.”
“You think that he …?”
“It was an idea, and if it was possible to get to the bottom of this I’d made up my mind to. I went to the old barn where his father used to live and I said, ‘I want a word with you, Young Jethro.’ He was a little puzzled and I said, ‘Your father shot my cousin. Now my wife has been shot in the arm—but that may have been a lucky chance—and I wondered whether your family made a habit of shooting at mine.’”
“Carleton! Do you really think …?”
“Not now. He swore to God that he had done no such thing and I am sure a man with his beliefs would never swear to God unless he was telling the truth. ‘Master,’ he said, ‘I’ve never killed none. If I was to, I’d be unworthy to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. ’Tis wrong to kill. It says so in the Bible. “Thou shalt not kill.” Should I kill another soul I could suffer torment for it.’ Then he fell down on his knees and swore to me that he had not been near the house that day. That he knew nothing of the accident. He had no gun. I could search the barn. He never killed … not even pigeons. He didn’t think it was right and fitting to kill God’s creatures … And so he went on and on … and I was convinced that he was telling me the truth.”
“Perhaps it was Leigh, after all.”
“It seems likely. He was there. He had the gun. He was shooting pigeons. Yes, it seems very likely. And yet … He was so insistent. He cried and cried. Sally couldn’t comfort him. He kept saying he didn’t do it. The shot had come right over his head … which points to the bushes behind the house. Never mind. Perhaps he did. Perhaps he didn’t realize which way he was shooting. He’s not usually an untruthful boy.”
“If he did, it was an accident.”
“But of course. As if Leigh would want to hurt you. He adores you. But I’m going to find out … if I can.”
“Who else could it be? If it be? If it wasn’t Leigh or Young Jethro …”
“It could have been one of the servants who is afraid to own up.”
“Perhaps we should forget it.”
“You’re getting too excited. Yes, perhaps we should forget it.”
But I knew he went on thinking of it, and I lay back in bed feeling cherished and greatly comforted.
But not for long. As my arm began to heal and first it came out of its bandages and then out of its sling and I saw that there was only the faintest scar to remind me of it, I began to sense a tension in the house, a lurking fear, the awareness that all was not as it outwardly seemed.
“You’ve had a proper shock,” Sally Nullens told me, and Ellen confirmed this. “First that miss,” went on Sally, “then this. It’s too much for one body to stand. It begins to have its effect on the nerves, that’s what.”
Ellen said: “It’s funny how shocks come … never one at a time. It’s often in twos and threes.”
“Am I to look out for number three?” I asked.
Sally said: “It’s always well to be on the lookout. But just at first we’ve got to get you well. I’ve got a very special cordial and it takes a lot of beating, don’t it, Ellen?”
“Are you talking of your buttermilk one?”
“That’s the one,” said Sally. “You shall drink it every night, Mistress Arabella. You’ll drop into a nice peaceful sleep and we all know there’s nothing like that for putting you to rights.”
So they talked to me, but although I drank Sally’s buttermilk cordial, I did not sleep well. My anxieties, it seemed, went too deep to be lightly thrust aside.
My suspicions had returned. Did Carleton really love me? Did he really want me now that I had failed to give him a son? What a magnificent delusion he had created with the Roundheads when he had pretended he was one of them. He was as good an actor as Harriet was.
And Harriet? There was something about her. She was sleekly happy, although she was no longer so much with her son, and I did not believe this contentment came from motherhood. I remembered when she had come to England with Edwin and me. Was it the same satisfaction I had glimpsed on her face then?
What did it mean?
When I walked out in the gardens, my footsteps invariably took me towards the arbour. It was beginning to exert a fascination over me. Now that the trees were losing their leaves I could see it from my bedroom window and I made a habit of looking at it.
Once when I found my footsteps leading me that way, I heard my name being called and turning saw Chastity running after me.
“Don’t go there, mistress,” she said. “Don’t go nowhere near that place. ’Tis haunted.”
“Oh, nonsense, Chastity,” I said. “There’s no such thing as hauntings. Come with me and we’ll go together.”
She hesitated. She had always been particularly fond of me since the day when I had given her a pretty button.
“Come on. We’ll go and look. I’ll prove to you that there’s nothing to fear. It’s just four walls overgrown by shrubs because no one has cut them back for a long time.”
She put her hand in mine, but I was aware that she was trying to drag me back as we went along.
I opened the door and stepped inside. The place smelt a little musty. The dampness of the wet wood and the smell of leaves permeated it.
They were together here … Harriet and Edwin … My eyes went to the window where the fanatical eyes of Old Jethro had looked in. I could almost hear the shattering of the glass, the firing of the fatal shot … at closer range than the one which had been fired at me. I could picture Harriet, stunned, and yet collecting her wits quickly enough to run to tell Carleton what had happened.
Chastity was looking up at me, her eyes round with horror.
“Mistress, it is haunted. Come away … now. …”
Yes, I thought. It is haunted … haunted by memories. I never want to come here again.
Chastity was tugging on my hands and we went outside.
“Well, you see,” I said, “there was nothing to fear.”
She looked at me curiously and said nothing. I noticed how hard she gripped my hand until we were well away from the arbour.
That night looking from my bedroom window I saw a light flickering close to the arbour. I stared, fascinated, watching it moving among the bushes like a will-o’-the-wisp.
Now the light had disappeared. A lantern, I guessed, and I wondered who carried it and whether he—or she—bad gone inside and for what purpose?
I watched for a long time, but I did not see the lantern again. I began to think that I had imagined it.
I was still feeling weak.
Sally said: “Women can take a year or two to recover from a miss. Some says it’s worse than a birth. It’s unnatural, like, you see. And then of course that other affair …”
She seemed to be right. I was not like the Arabella I had been. Sometimes I thought I would like to go to Far Flamstead and try to tell my mother something about the doubts and suspicions which seemed constantly to be chasing themselves round and round in my mind.
And yet I wanted to stay here. I felt there was something going on in the house, something which deeply concerned me. I wished I could shake off this uneasiness, this feeling of foreboding.
Was it really that someone had shot at me, had hoped to kill me? It had been said that I was lucky. The pellets had hit my arm. Had they gone into my head or some other vital part of my body, they could have been fatal.
If Leigh had not accidentally shot me, who had? Was it someone aiming at a pigeon … or at me?
Carleton had been summoned once more to Whitehall. He looked a little sad sometimes, as though he wondered what was going wrong with our marriage, for after that display of tenderness when I had had my accident, we seemed to be on edge, both of us. I was unable to express what I felt for him; indeed I was not sure. I wanted him to love me, to be with me, to act as a husband. It seemed sometimes that I was trying to make him a different person from what he was. I was suspicious, uncertain of him, asking myself whether it was possible for a man who had lived as he had to reform and become a faithful husband. I could not forget Edwin and the manner in which he deceived me; and I could see—while I was unable to prevent it—that I was allowing this to colour my life.
I continued to be fascinated by the arbour. One afternoon when the household was quiet, I went out into the garden and almost involuntarily my footsteps led me there.
It was November now—a dankness everywhere; almost all the leaves had fallen and only the conifers gleamed a shiny green. Cobwebs were draped over them, for it was the season of spiders.
And as I came near to the arbour I heard a voice which seemed to be singing a mournful dirge. I went closer and to my amazement there against the wall of the arbour knelt a man. I recognized him at once as Young Jethro.
I approached and studied him. He was on his knees and his hands were clasped together as in prayer. Then I realized that he was praying.
He stopped suddenly. He must have been aware of my presence. He turned sharply and looked at me out of those wild eyes which were almost hidden by the unkempt eyebrows.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Praying,” he said. “Praying to God. There have been murder done here. ’Tis an unhallowed place. I’m praying to God for the soul of my father.”
“I understand,” I said.
“Oh, God, save his soul from eternal torment,” he said. “What he done, he done for the glory of God but the Book says, ‘Thou shalt not kill’ and that means even in His name. My father killed a man here. He were Satan’s own, caught in Satan’s work … but, the Lord says, ‘Thou shalt not kill.’”
I said gently: “It was all long ago, Young Jethro. It is best to forget.”
“He burns in hell. A good life and one false step and for it … he burns in hell.”
I kept seeing it again. Should I ever forget it? That scene in the arbour and the madman with the gun. The lovers … caught there. Illicit love and Edwin dying instantly, and Harriet running into the house and the self-righteous man of God going back to his barn, the task he had set himself to do, done. And afterwards? Had he suffered remorse? He was a murderer no matter in which cause he had murdered. And he had disobeyed the law of God.
I felt stirred with pity for this strange, near-mad man. I wanted to comfort him. To tell him that I who had suffered the loss of my husband through his father’s action forgave. And he must forget.
But there would be no reasoning with him. I could see that reason and Young Jethro were strangers. There was only the law of God as he saw it, and he believed that his father, in spite of all his piety, had committed a mortal sin.
I turned, and as I walked away I heard him muttering his prayers.
There was one thing I was sure of now. Young Jethro had not been the one who fired the shot at me, and Carleton’s theory that the Jethros harboured enmity towards our family because we were Royalist and Young Jethro thought we were responsible for the licentious state of the country had no foundation in truth.
Then it was someone else.
It was Leigh, I told myself. It must be so. Poor child, he had fired in the wrong direction and then was so terrified of what he had done that he had convinced himself that he hadn’t done it.
I was all right now. All I had to do was regain my inner health, to muster my spirits, to throw off my misgivings and feel life was good again.
Carleton was still away. I was in the nursery with Sally and she was going through the children’s clothes and trying to decide what was needed. Later we should go to London and buy what was required.
Both Benjie and Priscilla were having that afternoon nap which Sally insisted they have, and the boys were out riding.
I was on the point of telling Sally about Young Jethro’s prayers at the arbour when Charlotte came in.
She went to the cots and looked at the sleeping children.
“How peaceful they look!” she murmured.
“Not much peace about them half an hour ago,” said Sally. “Benjie was screaming his head off and Mistress Priscilla had fallen down and dirtied her clean dress.”
“It’s all forgotten now,” commented Charlotte. “How soon their troubles are over. I was thinking we ought to do something about the arbour. It’s getting so overgrown.”
“Yes,” I said, alert suddenly.
“That old place should be pulled down, I reckon,” put in Sally. “What do you think of this muslin, mistress? Priscilla is getting too big for it. It’s in good order though. I’ll wash it and put it away. Who knows when it might come in handy?”
I knew she was referring to the fact that in due course I should have another child. It was a habit of hers, done, I believe, to reassure me. Dear Sally!
“I went inside the old arbour. I couldn’t resist it,” said Charlotte. “What a musty old place it is! Yes, I do think it should be pulled down. The paving must have been quite pretty at one time.”
I thought of the paving—a mosaic in pale blue and white, stained red with Edwin’s blood and Harriet watching him, panic seizing her, wondering what she must do.
I had to stop these pictures coming into my mind every time anyone mentioned the arbour.
I tripped over one of the paving-stones which was loose,” went on Charlotte. “I stopped to fit it in place and I found these funny things … like little dolls. … They seemed to have been put under the loose stone. What are they?”
She drew two little figures from the pocket of her dress.
“What would you say they are meant to be?” she went on.
Sally had come to look. She turned pale, then I saw that they were wax models. One had a look of someone. The set of the eyes, the shape of the moulded nose. Myself!
I looked at Sally and saw the hot colour flame into her face which a moment before had been so pale.
“That’s a witch’s work,” she said.
“What do you mean, Sally?” asked Charlotte. “They’re children’s toys, I think. But what were they doing under the paving-stone in the arbour?”
Sally picked up the figure which resembled me. “You see where the pins have been. There … where you would have been carrying the child.” She picked up the other figure. “Oh, my God. I see what it’s meant to be. It’s the wax image of an unborn child.”
We all looked at each other.
“How long have they been there, I wonder?” I said.
“I … I have only just found them,” stammered Charlotte.
“It looks as if …” began Sally. “No, I can’t say it.” She turned to me and laid her hand on my shoulder. “Oh, my poor Mistress Arabella, now we know …”
“Know what?” I demanded. “What are you talking about?”
“It’s witchcraft,” she said. “It’s killed the child … and it’s meant to harm you.”
Sally had kept the wax dolls. “I’ll destroy these,” she had said. “That’s the best thing that can be done with them. The mischief they’ve done is over. It’s a good thing you found them, Mistress Charlotte. Now we’ve got to keep our eyes open. At least we know what’s going on.”
When we had left her Charlotte said to me: “I wish I hadn’t shown them to her. I’m sure they mean nothing. They must be dolls children have had at some time. They might have been there years and become misshapen.”
“One of them had a look of me, Sally seemed to think.”
“Well, she would because of the accident. I wish I hadn’t been so thoughtless.” She looked at me anxiously. “All this hasn’t upset you, Arabella, has it?”
I assured her it hadn’t, but of course it had.
I was very uneasy. Carleton was in London. I wished he were here. I told myself that if he had been I should have gone to him and told him of Charlotte’s find and Sally’s comment. I could imagine his laughter. But I wanted to hear his laughter. I wanted to hear him pour scorn on what he would call “old goodies tales.”
I went to bed early. I could not sleep. I lay listening to every sound, and how the boards creaked! I would start to doze and then start up suddenly because something had roused me. Probably my own uneasy thoughts.
I heard midnight strike and lay listening to the timbre of the tower clock chime. I lay wondering about Carleton and what he was doing at Whitehall. I thought of all the stories one heard of the life that was lived there. The King was surrounded by favourites like Lady Castlemaine, Moll Davis—although I believe her reign was over—and Nell Gwyn. They lived lightheartedly, promiscuously, and Carleton was a member of that Court. I had heard it said that the King enjoyed his company. How could I help wondering who else did?
A sound in the corridor. Yes, footsteps. Silently creeping.
I leaped out of bed. I was shaking. I kept thinking of a doll made in my image with pinholes showing in the wax. It had not lain under the flagstone so very long. Those holes were too fresh for that. And what was the use of pretending it had? And it had been made to look like me!
The light sound of a footfall. Someone was creeping slowly along …
Cautiously, silently, I opened the door and peeped out. A light was moving along. It came from a candle which was being carried.
She was going carefully, her lovely long hair flowing about her shoulders, her feet in soft slippers, a robe flowing open to show the edges of a silken bedgown.
Harriet!
If she turned now she would see me. But she did not turn. She went on along the corridor.
I closed my door and leaned against it. What was Harriet doing creeping along the corridor when the household was asleep?
In the morning, I thought, I will tell her I saw her and ask her where she was going.
But I did not ask, for when I left my room and went downstairs the first person I met was Carleton.
“Carleton!” I cried. “When did you come home?”
“Last night,” he said. “Rather late.”
“Where did you sleep?”
“In the grey room. I thought I wouldn’t disturb you. Sally tells me you haven’t been sleeping well of late.”
“That … was thoughtful of you,” I said coolly, thinking of Harriet creeping silently along the corridor.
Carleton had gone off for the day; he had some estate business to attend to. So much time spent at Court was not good for the estate, he said. It meant that when he did return he found arrears of work.
“Will you be back tonight?” I asked.
He kissed me tenderly. “I shall,” he answered. “And however late I am I’ll disturb you.”
He kissed me with passion and my response was immediate. If only, I thought, all could be well between us, how much happier I should be.
I did not see Harriet during the morning. She seemed to have disappeared. Then I heard that the boys had gone riding with Gregory Stevens and Harriet had decided to accompany them. The would be away for most of the day, as Gregory had promised to take the boys to an inn where they could have a mug of ale and some hot bread and bacon. Chastity told me that they had gone off in high spirits.
It was a dark and misty afternoon. I was in my room when there was a knock on the door. It was Charlotte.
She looked strange, I thought, uneasy. But then she often did.
“Oh, Arabella,” she said, “I’m glad I found you alone. There’s something I wanted to say to you.”
“Yes.”
“Something is going on in this house. Oh, I don’t mean witchcraft, as old Sally says. But something nevertheless.”
“What?” I asked.
She was silent for a moment, then she said, “Oh, I know you think that I’m rather stupid …”
“Of course I don’t.”
“You don’t have to pretend. Most people do. Well, perhaps not stupid, but not very bright and not attractive … not like you and Harriet, for instance.”
“You’re imagining this.”
“I don’t think I am. But I’m not stupid. There are things I see which some people miss. You, for instance …”
“Why don’t you tell me what you came to say, Charlotte?”
“I’m trying to. It’s not easy. I don’t forget how you saved me once …”
“Oh, that’s long ago.”
“I’ve always remembered. Sometimes I wonder whether I should have done it. People think they will leave this world and then at the last minute they’re afraid. I just thought there wasn’t anything to live for. They had made so much fuss about Charles Condey … having that house party, talking of making the announcement … I just didn’t think I could face it.”
“I understand that.”
“Harriet is evil, Arabella. Do you know that? Oh, I’m not sure about witchcraft. But I do know she is evil. She wantonly broke up my life … now she will do the same to you. She already did it once, didn’t she? I knew how it was with her and Edwin. I knew right at the start. I daresay you’ll despise me, but I listen at doors. I pry and peep and find out things. It’s mean and underhand but it compensates me in a way. I don’t have much life of my own so I live other people’s. I know more than they do, because I listen and peep and that justifies me in a way because I’m not bright and attractive. Do you understand?”
“Of course I do. But, Charlotte …”
She waved her hand. “Listen. She married Uncle Toby, didn’t she, because she wanted to come here and she wanted his name and title because she was determined he should get it. You don’t think Benjie is Uncle Toby’s son, do you?”
“Whose?” I asked.
“Are you so innocent, Arabella?”
I felt myself flushing hotly. “Charlotte, you are talking nonsense.”
“No. She wanted a son who was a claimant. Benjie to follow on Edwin.”
“Are you suggesting that she would dare hurt Edwin? That’s nonsense.”
“Perhaps I have said too much. You would rather not hear.” She shrugged her shoulders. “Forgive me, Arabella. I wanted to repay you … for saving my life once, but if you would be happier not knowing … if you would rather wait until doom overtakes you …”
“Tell me what you know,” I said tersely.
“I know this. Edwin was her lover. He was shot when they were in the arbour. At that time she was already carrying his child. Leigh is not Charles Condey’s son.”
“I know,” I said.
“So she deceived you with Edwin. Then she ran away, leaving you to look after your husband’s bastard, and you did. Arabella, you are a good woman. It grieves me to see you treated thus. But you are blind … sometimes I think wilfully blind. You really thought Benjie was Uncle Toby’s son. That was rather naive. Poor Uncle Toby, he had to die when she was pregnant.”
“Are you suggesting she … killed him.”
“In a comfortable, natural sort of way which could hardly be brought against her. It wasn’t difficult to excite the old gentleman. She knew he had already had his heart attack. Child’s play. She knew she would do it sooner or later. So natural, they said, didn’t they, an ageing husband, a young exciting wife.”
“Oh, don’t, Charlotte.”
“I know you hate it. I wouldn’t say anymore, but you’re in danger, Arabella. Don’t you see what they want?”
“They? Who?”
“Harriet and … Carleton.”
“Carleton!”
“Surely you know. Why is he away so much? Is he in London, do you think? Edwin was away on secret business, wasn’t he? Secret business with Harriet. She has their son. Benjie. Have you noticed that Carleton is rather fond of him? She has proved she can have sons. They want to marry. They want to take Eversleigh and rule it between them.”
“Carleton already does that for Edwin. You’ve forgotten Edwin. Eversleigh is Edwin’s.”
“What do you think they plan for Edwin? A little pigeon shooting? No, perhaps that wouldn’t do. The last one was not a success.”
“Charlotte, this is madness.”
“There’s madness in this house, Arabella. The madness of greed and illicit passion and hatred and murder. Open your eyes and look. Who was the first on the scene when you were shot? He hadn’t far to come from the bushes, had he? Don’t you see? Death’s hovering over your head. Like a great black bird. Can’t you hear his wings? You first, then Edwin …”
“Oh, no … no …”
“They are together. I’ve seen them.”
I closed my eyes. I pictured Harriet moving stealthily along the corridor, a candle in her hand. I could hear Carleton’s voice: “… Rather late. I thought I wouldn’t disturb you …” I cried: “No. No!” But it could fit so easily.
“They have a meeting place. They leave notes there. In the arbour. I have seen some of them. That was how I came to find the wax dolls. It’s a sort of bravado that makes them go there. It’s like snapping their fingers at fate. Then, of course, not many people would want to go there after dark, would they? It satisfies their sense of the macabre … and at the same time it’s safe. That’s a good point. They don’t want to be discovered before they’ve completed their plans … their devious, hideous plans. Oh, Arabella, you look at me so strangely. I think you don’t believe me.” She shrugged her shoulders. “Perhaps I shouldn’t have told you. But how could I keep silent? I tell you death is right overhead. It’s come very near to you and you’ve escaped by the luck of the moment. It frightens me, Arabella. I don’t know what to do … to save you … to save Edwin. I know what is in their black hearts. I have seen them together, I have listened to them. But you doubt me. I tell you what. Let us go to the arbour … now. They leave notes there for each other. Perhaps she is there now … with him. Who can say? She said she was going riding, but is she, I wonder?”
“As soon as Carleton comes in I shall talk to him,” I said. “I shall talk to Harriet.”
“You cannot mean that. What would they say? Charlotte is lying. Charlotte is mad, and they might even convince you. They would be shocked to think they had not been careful enough to escape detection. But I know it would only postpone your fate. You are doomed, Arabella—you and your son Edwin. No matter what I reminded them of they would stand together against me … and you would believe them because you wanted to. You won’t give yourself a chance to see the proof … even now.”
“Show me this proof,” I said.
Her eyes lit up suddenly. “Oh, Arabella, I’m so glad you’re ready to look at the truth. Let us go to the arbour now. I saw her go in there before she went off. I know where they hide their messages. If he has not already been in to take it we shall find it. Come now.”
She put her arm through mine and together we went out of the house.
The arbour looked dismal in the dim light of a November afternoon, and I felt sick with fear as we went across the grass.
“It’s a horrible place,” said Charlotte. “I always hated it. Come on … quickly, Arabella.”
She pushed open the door and we went in. I was relieved that no one was there. She stopped and lifted the broken paving-stone.
“There’s nothing there,” I said.
“There’s another one over there. Look.”
I went to the spot where she pointed. She was right. I lifted the stone. There was a piece of paper there. I felt sick with horror. Something was written on it but I could not see what.
“It looks just like childish scribble,” I said.
I turned. I was alone, and the door was shut.
“Charlotte,” I called. I went towards the door.
I heard her voice: “It’s jammed. I can’t open it.” She was right. It would not budge. Then I noticed that the key which usually hung on a nail there was missing.
“I’ll go and get someone,” she called.
So I was alone in the arbour. I looked at the paper in my hand. Just a scrawl across it. What did it mean? A code of some sort, perhaps. What a foolish notion. It was like something Priscilla might have done.
I sat down on the bench. How I hated the place. Edwin … Harriet … and now Carleton and Harriet. History grimly repeating itself.
“I don’t believe it,” I said aloud. “I can’t believe it.”
I heard a sound. I was alert, listening. They must have come to release me. I called out. Then I heard a sound which made me cold with terror. It was the unmistakable crackle of wood and I saw that smoke was seeping into the arbour. The place was on fire.
I ran to the door and threw myself against it. It did not budge. I understood. It was locked from the outside.
“Oh, God,” I prayed. “What is happening to me? Charlotte. Charlotte … is it you, then, who are trying to kill me?”
“Let me out!” I cried. “Let me out!”
I hammered on the door. How firm the old wood was. The heat was getting intolerable. It could not be long before this wooden structure was ablaze.
I felt myself fainting, for the heat was becoming intense. This is the end, I thought. I should die without knowing why Charlotte hated me so.
I felt a rush of air suddenly. Then the flames roared up.
I was seized, picked up and carried into oblivion.
Old Jethro had killed Edwin, and Young Jethro had saved my life. Regaining my consciousness I was vaguely aware of him as he kneeled beside me, giving thanks to God. “A miracle,” he was shouting. “God has seen fit to show me a miracle.” I was carried into the house. He put me into Sally’s charge.
To have faced death once more and this time being saved only by Jethro’s miracle gave me a strangely exalted feeling. I suppose my mind was wandering and I was unaware that I was lying on my bed. Sally had sent for the doctor. I had suffered no burns, only a scorching of the skin of one hand. It was the smoke which had come near to suffocating me. Not more than a few minutes could have lapsed between the time Charlotte set the arbour alight and Jethro got me out. He had been watching us. It seemed that he had spent many hours of his days watching and praying at the arbour. He had seen Charlotte lock me in; he had seen her throw inflammable oil on the bracken about the arbour and on its walls and ignite the place. Then he had come straight in and got me out.
He was like a man possessed. He had prayed for a sign that his father was forgiven and taken into Heaven, and this he was sure was it. His father had taken a life and he had been given the chance to save one.
“Praise God in His Heaven,” he cried.
I was deeply shocked, said the doctor. I must lie quietly. I must take care.
And indeed I had every reason to be shocked. Within a short time murder had been twice attempted and I its victim. No one—except Sally—could say that my miscarriage was due to anything but natural misfortune, but that there had been two attempts on my life was obvious.
When Carleton returned to the house he came at once to my room.
When I saw his face I asked myself how I could ever have been so foolish as to have doubted him. If ever I needed proof that he loved me, it was there in his eyes for me to read.
He knelt by my bed. He took my hand, the one which was not bandaged, and kissed it.
“My dearest, what is going on? Is this a madhouse?”
“I think there is madness in it,” I said.
He knew that I had been shut in the arbour but when he heard that Charlotte had locked me in, he was astounded.
“Where in God’s name is she?” he asked. “We must find her. She will do someone an injury. She must have gone completely mad.”
But Charlotte had disappeared.
They searched for her but they could not find her. Carleton stayed by my bedside. He made me tell him everything that had happened. I could hold nothing back now. It all came tumbling out, my doubts, my suspicions, my fears, and as I talked and he listened there came to us a revelation and that was that we had been brought face to face with ourselves. We loved each other; no one had ever or could ever mean the same to us. Edwin had not really died in the arbour; he had lived on to stand between us. We had both of us built up our own image of Edwin and his importance in our life. I had convinced myself that I had truly loved him and that because he had deceived me I would never trust anyone again. Carleton had believed that I would never let him take that place which had been Edwin’s. I think we saw then how foolish we had been. How we had allowed a false conception to corrode our marriage.
Lying there in my bed with Carleton sitting beside me while we talked to each other in low, intense voices, laying bare our innermost thoughts, the revelation came to us. It was a chance to begin again, free from our shackles, to live again to find our happiness together.
One of the servants going into the library early next morning found a letter which was addressed to me.
My hands shook as I opened it, for I saw that it was in Charlotte’s handwriting.
“How did you get this?” I demanded.
“It was in the library, mistress,” was the answer, “propped up against the books on one of the shelves.”
I opened it and read:
Dear Arabella,
I owe you an explanation. When I had set fire to the arbour I came into the house and watched from one of the windows. When I saw Young Jethro carry you out I knew that was the end for me. Do you remember when you came with Edwin and Harriet you hid in that secret cavity in the library? Few people knew about it. It has been kept like that for family emergencies. … I went and hid myself there. I took paper and pen there and I am writing this to you now. I hate anything to be unfinished. So I don’t just want to disappear. If I did it would create one of those mysteries about which people speculate and make up all sorts of legends.
You know how it has always been with me. I am the outsider … the disappointment. Even my parents couldn’t hide their exasperation with me sometimes. I never shone at parties. I remember hearing my mother say once, “How are we ever going to find a husband for Charlotte?” I was fifteen at the time. I was so desperately unhappy I decided to take my life. Cut my veins as the Romans die. So you see when you found me at the parapet there it was not the first time I had contemplated taking my life. It was a sort of balm to my anger. They’ll be sorry then, I would say, and would be comforted contemplating their sorrow. People who constantly threaten a suicide for the discomfiture of others rarely do it. But there can come a time when there is no turning back.
I’m giving myself the luxury of writing to you now and I must resist the temptation to go on and on. I have to be brief.
I thought I was going to marry Charles Condey but Harriet spoilt that. If I had married him I might have settled down and become an ordinary wife—not very exciting, of course, but then Charles was not exciting. He was the one for me. How I hated her. I could have killed her. When I found out Edwin was her lover I was comforted in a way. I had not been the only one who had suffered. It shows you my nature, which is not at all admirable, I fear.
Then we came home and when I saw Carleton I admired him so much. He seemed to be in command of his life as I never could be. He is the sort of person I should have liked to be. My parents were always saying what a pity it was he was married to Barbary, and when she died I heard them say, “Now if Carleton married Charlotte, what a marvellous solution that would be.” I don’t think I should have thought of it as a possibility but for that. Then I started to think about it. Why not? It would be convenient. Married to Carleton. I thought that would be wonderful. I almost loved Harriet for preventing my marriage to Charles Condey.
Then you married Carleton so suddenly and unexpectedly because you’d always seemed to dislike each other. I hadn’t thought of you as a rival. It wasn’t that I hated you. I could never do that. I just hated life and fate or whatever you call it which had been against me from the start. I watched Harriet. I saw how she used people and I said to myself, why shouldn’t I use people too? Of course I know she is very handsome and amusing and people are attracted by her, but if you have none of these gifts you can be subtle and clever and work in the dark. So that was what I did. I thought that if you died Carleton would be so distressed he would turn to me. I believe my mother would have done everything she could to bring about a marriage between us. I knew how Carleton felt about you. I’d seen him watching you. I know him well. I know all people well. When you don’t have much life of your own, you watch other people … you live other people’s lives. The sound of his voice when he spoke of you … the look in his eyes. I knew that if you died he would not care very much, and if it was convenient, which it would have been, and if there was a little gentle persuasion from the family … someone to look after the children … it could well be. That was what I worked for. As for Harriet, he disliked her. I don’t know what it is about people like those two. They are both experienced with the other sex … both very attractive to people … and yet with each other there is an instant dislike. He hated Harriet being in this house. He hated her influence with you. I knew that he would never marry her—nor she, him, unless it was to get control of Eversleigh. And that was Edwin’s. She was proud to have her Benjie next in line, but she was leaving that to fate. She would never hurt Edwin. All she wanted was a place of comfort. That was what she had worked for all her life.
So it was you I wanted out of the way. I wanted Carleton. He saw how I liked the children. He once said to me: “You should have had children, Cousin Charlotte.” That seemed to me a signpost. I started to plan. I knew how things were between you. I understood you both well. He was angry because he thought you cared for Edwin as you never could for him, and you couldn’t forget how Edwin had deceived you and you thought Carleton was doing the same. You were both of you pouring poison into the marriage cup. You deserved to lose each other.
I used to dream of the years ahead, Carleton and I married, children of our own. That was what I wanted. Then I would be able to forget everything that led up to it. I’m telling you this because I hate loose ends. I want you to understand why I did what I did. I don’t want you to say: “Oh, Charlotte was mad.” Charlotte was not mad. Charlotte was clever. She knew what she wanted and she was only trying to get it. But things went wrong. I shot at you from the bushes, but you moved at the wrong moment and you were only wounded in the arm and that put you on guard which was not helpful to me.
Then I decided that I must act quickly because you were going to be very watchful after the shooting. I put the wax dolls in the arbour. I was going to make Sally suspicious of Harriet. I was going to make it believed that she was a witch. After all, people were only too ready to accept that. They would say it was witchcraft which made you lose the child … though I had no hand in that. Of course it wasn’t witchcraft that wounded you. But it could be said that the Devil guided Leigh’s hand. That was what people were saying. Then I thought of the arbour. That would have worked but for Young Jethro. Who could have believed that a mad man could have spoilt all my plans?
It’s over for me now. I am caught. What can I do? I have to put into practice what I had often thought of doing and failed to do before. This time there is no turning back.
As soon as it is dark I am going to creep out of this house. I shall walk to the sea. Look in the cave … you remember the cave? You hid there while you waited for horses to bring you to the house. There you will find my cloak … high on a rock where the tide cannot reach it. I shall have disappeared from you life forever. I am going to walk into the sea … and walk, and walk …
Good-bye, Arabella. You can be happy now. Learn to understand Carleton, as he will learn to understand you. Charlotte.
We found her cloak where she had said it would be. We went to the hidden cavity behind the library books. There she had left paper and pen, so we knew it was all as she had said.
Poor Charlotte, I think of her often. Where the arbour was we have made a flower garden. The roses flourish there, and we have cleared away the charred bracken and it has become part of the garden. No one says it’s haunted now. Few remember that once an arbour stood there.
Harriet left us only a few weeks after Charlotte’s death.
The elder brother of Gregory Stevens was killed when his horse threw him and Gregory inherited lands and title. Harriet married him. They had long been lovers. They went, taking Benjie with them. Harriet told me that he was Gregory’s son.
I see them about twice a year. Harriet has lost her slim and willowy figure. She is in truth a little plump but I don’t think that detracts from her charm. She still retains that, and now that she is contented with life, having achieved her goal, seems to live very happily.
And I too. Carleton and I have our son, Carl. It is a good life. Not without its conflicts, of course. We rage against each other now and then, but our love deepens as time passes and we know that we belong to each other and nothing can alter that.
This morning I was at the arbour cutting roses to fill my basket, and I realized suddenly that I saw only the beautiful flowers now.
I had learned to bury the past, and when I did remember it, to see it as an experience which would show me the way to preserve the contentment which life was offering me.
I said something of this to Carleton. He was inclined to be flippant—but then he often is, I have discovered, when he is most serious.
I am content. Life is good. It is for us to keep it so.