Since he had to be Ireland for his wife’s funeral, Robert’s superior at the War Office had asked whether he would mind staying on to attend to some official business. Aware that it would save another journey immediately afterwards, Robert agreed, but not without some degree of concern for his daughter, forced to make the long journey back to York alone.
The War Office business kept him in Dublin for several days. Days in which he was forced to listen to his sister Letty’s catalogue of anxieties regarding her niece, also her admonitions on his role as her father. With his conscience suitably nagged into life, on his return he wrote to Georgina, but her reply was not reassuring. The letter seemed flat and depressed – understandable, perhaps, in the circumstances, but leaving much apparently unsaid. With a couple of days at his disposal, Robert decided to pay her another visit. The decision cheered him, especially when it came to him that if he timed it carefully, he might also spend an hour or so with Louisa.
A telephone call to the Retreat’s superintendent established his daughter’s free time and a suitable appointment. The following morning he took a cab to King’s Cross and caught the express for York. Depositing his bags at the Royal Station Hotel, Robert found himself thinking of the summer of ‘99, when Kruger’s antics in the Transvaal had kept everyone in suspense. Knowing war was coming, seeing too clearly the impossibility of family life, Robert had finally relinquished his ties with Louisa. It was what she had wanted, but it had taken a war to make him see the sense of it.
As he approached the riverside with its unchanging vistas, the flourishing trees and soft, sandy path, he remembered all the old passions, and the jealousy which had made it so hard to accept her marriage. Even now he found it difficult to believe that Louisa had really preferred a quiet life with Edward to the heady passion she had shared with him. Their relationship had been passionate, perhaps too much so, heaven and hell at times; but recalling the sparks that had flashed between them so recently, Robert knew the magic was still alive, stirring the embers of that old affair.
There had never been anyone to match her. Desire remained, despite the other women, the years abroad, the stupid things he had said and done. She was a loving and lovable woman, and he still wanted her, that was the hell of it.
With the cottage in sight, a frisson of nervous anticipation made him pause. Screened by trees and the lie of the land, it stood no more than a few hundred yards from busy riverside wharves and the spread of new housing off Bishopthorpe Road. In the nearby meadows cows munched contentedly, giving an illusion of deepest countryside. On the river a couple of barges were idling their way downstream, and in Louisa’s front garden the subdued buzz of bees foraging amongst the flowers was almost the only sound.
Outside the gate, in dappled shade, Robert noticed a wooden board, listing fruits and vegetables – all fresh from the garden – and their respective prices. Envisaging possible interruptions, his euphoria evaporated. With a sigh he pushed open the newly-painted gate, hoping his walk would merit at least a cool drink and a shady seat. A light tap on the front door produced no answer. At the back of the house the kitchen door stood open, but she was not inside, and even the garden seemed deserted.
A moment later, with her sleeves pushed back and wearing a sunbonnet, Louisa emerged from behind the screen of glorious pink roses, bearing a gardening trug full of lettuce and soft fruits.
He felt his breath catch. Seeing her like that, he was instantly transported back twenty years, to an afternoon when they had walked across broad meadows, she in a pretty cotton dress and flapping sunbonnet, he minus jacket and tie, to that wood outside Blankney. And there, under an oak wreathed about with mistletoe, they had made love for the very first time...
The memory was so clear, it was almost painful. She was as graceful as ever. And just as desirable. Meeting his gaze she paused, pushing back a few stray tendrils of hair which had escaped the loose chignon beneath her bonnet. As a young woman, she had worn her hair cropped short like a boy’s, a mark of independence that in those days had suited her very well. Now she was older, he preferred the softer image.
Seeing him, Louisa’s expression hovered between pleasure and dismay, and settled, ultimately, into a wry smile. Her step was resolute as she approached, as though she had decided to make the best of things. It was not an encouraging start; and as he kissed her cheek it seemed to Robert that her eyes weighed him rather too well.
‘You shouldn’t be here,’ she said, laying a hand against his heart. ‘Although, having said that, I have to admit I’m pleased to see you.’
‘You don’t sound it,’ he said with light reproof.
‘Perhaps pleased is the wrong word,’ she observed cryptically. ‘Thankful would be nearer the mark.’
He made to follow her inside, but she stopped him. ‘Edward said – after your last visit – that he wouldn’t have you across his doorstep again. And you can’t blame him. So don’t make me tell a lie. Stay there,’ she added, ‘and I’ll fetch you something to drink.’
She came out a few minutes later with a tray of glasses and a jug of lemonade, setting it down on a stool before the long garden seat. ‘I said I’d write to you and explain the situation,’ Louisa began, ‘but since then something else has been worrying me. Something you should know about, since it concerns Georgina.’
Sighing heavily, she glanced at him, and he saw anxiety and apprehension lurking there. Then, quite unexpectedly, she slipped a brown, work-roughened hand into his. Robert was far from sure whether she was seeking comfort, or giving it.
‘I should have written,’ she murmured huskily, ‘but I’ve been putting it off, simply because it would have been so hard to express in a letter. So I’m glad to see you, even though Edward will be furious if he knows you’ve been here again.’ Her eyes met his and pleaded with him. ‘We have to talk – and very seriously – about our children.’
At the age of fourteen, Edward had begun his working life in Fossgate, apprenticed to a firm of printers and bookbinders. He had stayed with the same firm for twenty-five years before opening his own business in the maze of courts and alleys which in those days constituted Piccadilly. Eight years later, in 1901, he had moved on. His old premises had recently disappeared under a new, broad thoroughfare; now, walking down the new Piccadilly, Edward could no longer distinguish the place where his old business had been. It seemed very strange.
York was changing and growing, but although change was needed he found it hard to accept and even harder to like what he saw. It was, he suspected, a symptom of age. He was growing old and becoming entrenched, finding safety in familiar things, resenting the turmoil brought about by progress. Only in the unchanging heart of the city could he close his eyes to it.
The area of Minster Gates, Stonegate and its adjacent alleyway, Coffee Yard, was the traditional home of York publishing, and although his premises were ancient and even less practical than the old ones in Piccadilly, it gave Edward a sense of satisfaction to know that writers, printers and bookbinders had occupied the place for centuries before him.
Coffee Yard was, in reality, no more than a paved short-cut leading between tall medieval buildings. It ran past a walled courtyard and beneath the upper floors of two half-timbered houses, emerging eventually into Grape Lane. Narrow on the ground floor, Edward’s premises opened out to more spacious rooms above. The huge oak beams and steep staircases, odd angles and unsquare walls, had made the moving of equipment something of a nightmare; now, with offices below and workrooms on the middle and upper floors, they were well-settled. For light and size Edward’s favourite was in the middle, where two massive Georgian windows had been installed at the beginning of the previous century. It had drawbacks, however: freezing cold in winter, it needed a good fire in the hearth, while summer sun often made the heat unbearable.
Sighing as he returned from lunch and a visit to the bank, Edward stood for a moment in the cool alleyway, relishing the breeze and the shade. As his bank manager had suggested, it was probably an afternoon for contemplating the accounts, a job that Liam had been badgering him about for weeks.
In that respect the lad was methodical, but Edward wished he was a better bookbinder. As apprentices went, Liam was not a bad one; but if only, Edward thought, he would stop making such foolish mistakes! It was lack of application that afflicted him, not lack of ability, and his carelessness was increasing. Attributable, Edward was sure, to calf-love and the uneasy proximity of Georgina Duncannon. The sooner Louisa saw that and took steps to rectify it, the better.
In an irritable humour, Edward went inside. Amongst the clutter on his desk, was the lunchtime post.
In the rear ground-floor room, Liam was using the guillotine, cutting boards for a set of twelve books. Remembering an earlier mistake, when he had cut a complete set fractionally short, he checked every one against a template. As the outside door banged and Edward went into his office, Liam marked the time with some resentment. An hour and a half for lunch, he thought bitterly, knowing anything over his own half-hour would be an occasion for criticism. Wearing no more than a thick apron over his shirt and trousers, he was still sweating, his shirt damp with it, despite its open neck and rolled back sleeves. Wiping his forehead, Liam gathered the boards together and went back up the winding staircase to the next floor.
Heat, and the pungent, sickly smell of horse-glue hit him as he entered the workroom. Angrily, he reached across a wide bench to force up the sash another two inches. With that sharp movement the cord snapped, bringing the lower window crashing down. He swore roundly, not caring whether his father heard him, and a moment later Edward’s foot was on the stair.
Liam ground out an apology between gritted teeth. ‘It’s so bloody hot in here, I was only trying to get a bit more air into the place! It’s broken – I’m sorry.’
But Edward’s attention was not confined to the window. In his hand was an opened parcel. In an overly dramatic gesture, he peeled off the paper and flung it aside.
‘What do you call this?’ he demanded, holding out a large tome, expensively bound in leather.
Recognizing it as one of a set he had been allowed to help with, Liam took it resentfully, wondering what minor blemish had been found. While Edward looked on, he turned it over and over, examining spine and engraving, the smooth gold edges of the paper.
‘I can’t see anything wrong with it.’
‘Open it!’
Liam did so, and his heart sank. He had bound the book upside down.
The ensuing row was explosive, fuelled by the heat and a score of festering resentments. For Edward, the book was the last straw in a pack of other stupid mistakes; while Liam, who had rarely answered back before, countered the charges of incompetence with a few of his own. He brought up the subject of the neglected accounts, telling his father that if he did not pay more attention to outstanding bills, bankruptcy would be the next step. Grossly insulted, Edward grabbed a heavy bookbinding manual and flung it into the boy’s outstretched arms.
‘And if you paid less attention to young women beyond your age and station,’ he snapped, ‘and more to your work, you might have a job to look forward to in ten years’ time!’
Liam’s heart seemed to halt in his breast.
So I was right, he thought: they do know what I feel for Georgina. Hurt more by that one shot than anything else, Liam placed the manual carefully on the bench. Without a word he removed his glue-spotted apron and reached for his jacket and tie. Edward watched him, his expression sardonic.
‘And where do you think you’re going?’
‘Does it matter?’ Liam asked, fixing his collar.
‘The work matters.’
‘Not to me. Not anymore.’ With that he clattered down the stairs and into the yard for his bike.
Short of a dignified answer, Edward could only bite his tongue and watch him go.
Smarting from the argument, yet curiously elated by his bravery in walking out, Liam cycled through town in the early afternoon heat, convinced he had done the right thing. If nothing else, it would show his father that he was not prepared to tolerate such constant, belittling criticism. He hated that sharpness of manner which took no account of his efforts or abilities. The book was a stupid mistake, he could admit that, but it had been done at the end of a long, hot day, and the thing was rectifiable.
No, it was more than his carelessness, more than the other silly things he had done and forgotten to do, the whole list of which had been itemized for his benefit. It was all a matter of his affection for Georgina, that friendship which for him, at least, had grown into love. She was so far beyond his reach, he knew it could never come to anything, despite all his dreams and fantasies. He simply loved to be with her: was that so very wrong? His parents’ disapproval was hurtful and incomprehensible. It seemed to Liam that since they liked and admired Georgina, any fault must lie with him. He knew he was not good enough for her, but it might have been expected that his parents would think otherwise.
He decided to go home and have it out with his mother. She could usually be counted upon to see his point of view, and she was generally more forthright than his father. Whatever the outcome, Liam knew that the argument had brought something to a head. With regard to his immediate future, at least. Perhaps he should go abroad, as Georgina suggested; it would be hard to leave, but in the leaving she might realize she loved him too, and follow, eventually...
Still in the realms of fantasy, Liam cycled along the riverbank, glad of the shade provided by the trees. He dismounted at the gate, pushing it open fully, careful not to chip the new paint. In his eagerness to solve a problem, he abandoned his bike by the side wall and walked round on the grass. Within a couple of paces the sound of voices halted him.
At first he thought his mother must be talking to a neighbour, someone buying fruit or flowers from the garden; then he heard his name mentioned, and a responding male voice which set every hackle bristling.
Not again! He pictured Georgina’s father flirting with his mother over tea on the lawn. The very idea made him want to rush round the corner and put a stop to it. But words penetrated, freezing anger and action simultaneously, making him listen almost without breathing.
Entirely unaware of a listener only yards away, Robert and Louisa were speaking heatedly, possessed as much by old passions and grievances, as by the immediate problem.
‘I’ll say it again, Louisa – this situation should never have been allowed to arise. She’s their sister, for God’s sake, and they should all have been told years ago.’
‘Half-sister,’ Louisa repeated through gritted teeth, ‘and I’ll thank you not to tell me what I should have done. The responsibility of bringing them up was left to me, while you gallivanted round the world, playing soldiers!’
‘You left me, remember? To marry another man! I would never have abandoned you, Louisa, and you know it.’
With a catch in her voice, Louisa said: ‘Why do you always go back to that? I married Edward because I loved him, because he needed me and we understood each other in ways you and I never did. It’s been a good marriage, and he’s been a good father to your children – far better than you ever were or will be!’
‘This is getting us nowhere,’ Robert declared bitterly. ‘His virtues don’t interest me. The point is it’s time you stopped sticking your head in the sand, Louisa. Tell Liam the truth, for God’s sake. Tell him straight – that he’s my son, and Georgina’s his sister. She’s always known – she doesn’t need warning off!’
Stunned and disbelieving, shocked to the point where he thought he was going to be physically sick, for a moment Liam hunched himself against the wall. He was Robert Duncannon’s son? Georgina, his sister? No, it couldn’t be!
With his head spinning, he stumbled away. Grabbing his bike for support, he crashed it through the gateway, mounted on leaden limbs and rode off down-river. Wobbling dangerously for the first few hundred yards, he fell off twice, eventually regained his balance, and pedalled furiously the three or four miles to Bishopthorpe, as though speed could outdistance the pain. Just before the village, too violently distressed to face other human beings, Liam flung the bike aside, stripped off his clothes and made a perfect dive into the river. He swam almost a mile up-stream before exhaustion overtook him, and floated back, staring up at the wide blue sky, at trees dark in their midsummer leaf, and the larks singing joyously above.
The physical world seemed possessed of a burning clarity, illogical and unreasonable against the appalling destruction of his life. The sun warmed his face while his body, like his mind, was numb. For a while he imagined drowning, but knew he could not by act of will. It would have to be cramp, or weeds dragging him under, and either were possible with the river so low and the water so cold. He passed the spot where he had left his clothes, and on the next curve there was the Archbishop’s Palace, its graceful walls rising from the river, the mullioned windows glinting like eyes as he floated past.
The current was strong there, and swimming back against it took tremendous effort. When he reached the place where he had dived in, it was all he could do to scramble out. Wet and shivering uncontrollably, he pulled on pants and trousers, lying back like a dead man in the hot afternoon sun.
Grievously wounded but feeling no pain, Liam examined the shreds that were left. Strangely, in that moment, he doubted nothing of what he had heard. It all fitted too well. That extraordinary likeness between Robin and Robert Duncannon: even the names. His mother’s reluctance to mention Mrs Duncannon. Short tempers, jealousy, tension: he almost laughed when he thought of his own innocent, pathetic interpretation. He even felt a queer, detached pity for the man who had been his father. But Edward Elliott was his father no more; and it seemed his adored mother was no better than the women who flaunted themselves after dark on New Walk. No wonder she could flirt so brazenly with the Colonel, Liam thought bitterly: he was her lover, the father of her children. The man who sat at the head of her table was simply someone she had married to cover her sin.
And Georgina Duncannon, the woman he had loved and dreamed of making his own, was as forbidden a fruit as ever came out of the Garden of Eden. She was his sister. Her father was his father, and Liam hated him.
After a little while he fell asleep, waking hours later to find that some kindly passer-by had spread his shirt over his chest to protect him from the sun. Nevertheless, he was confused and shivering and his skin felt hot and tight. Dressing clumsily, his first thought was to get home for something to eat and drink, particularly to drink, since he had a raging thirst. Then he remembered and was violently sick.
What he had been able to contemplate with such icy calm after his swim, was suddenly impossible to face without cursing and weeping. For several minutes he did just that, then fatigue claimed him again, and he dropped by the river’s edge. He felt alone, bereft, as though his entire family had been wiped out by some freak accident; and, like someone so tragically bereaved, could not believe it.
Amidst the shock and pain, the thing to which he kept returning was Robert Duncannon’s claim that Georgina was his sister and had always known it. If that was truth, then it turned his love for her into something abhorrent; perverted the time and attention she had bestowed into sadistic amusement; made him demand with silent, bitter repetition, why she could not have told him. Her knowledge, her silence, had made of him an ignorant, gullible fool. Had she pitied him, Liam wondered, or simply laughed at his obvious adoration? Either way it was insupportable, unforgivable, and he knew he would never be able to face her again.
But it could not be true, Liam thought, could not be true. If it was, then his whole life was a lie, without the smallest foundation. His parents had always insisted on honesty: how could people like that have built their lives on deceit? Perhaps he should go home and ask them. Perhaps he would find that it had all been a terrible nightmare: Robert Duncannon had never been to the cottage, his mother had never said those things, and all would be as it was before. But a low, evil voice in his mind kept reminding him that he had heard that angry exchange, and because of it, nothing would ever be the same again.
Time passed, dusk became darkness and still he sat there. Rinsing his face in the cool water, Liam’s mind grasped at straws: perhaps they knew he was there and wanted only to shock him, to stop him loving Georgina. Perhaps they were rehearsing lines from a play...
But names were mentioned, the voice replied, his name, her name, his father’s name. No, not his father. His real father was Colonel Duncannon, the arrogant bastard, the charmer, ladies’ man, the cavalry officer who thought himself so much better than Edward Elliott...
‘The bastard,’ Liam whispered, repeating the word like an incantation as he dragged his bike out of the long grass. He used it all the way home. It was the only protection he had against the wall of pain which was crashing around him.
Louisa glanced yet again at the clock. It was almost eleven and Liam had been gone since two. Where on earth could he be at this time? Robin had been to the drill hall, and on his way home had questioned most of his acquaintances, but nobody had seen him, and Louisa’s anxiety was turning to panic. At his desk, Edward was working, an excuse, she knew, for waiting up for Liam, even though he seemed convinced the boy was worrying them deliberately.
‘He’s paying me back,’ Edward had said several times that evening, ‘for telling him off this afternoon.’
Arriving home just after six, he had been irritated to find Liam still missing, and with justifiable anger had repeated the tale of what had passed between them in the workshop. ‘It won’t do,’ he kept saying, ‘the boy must understand that he cannot simply walk out on an employer, even though I am his father. He wouldn’t get away with it anywhere else, and he must realize he can’t get away with it now. I’m afraid there’ll have to be some plain speaking when he does come home.’
But while Edward went over the situation several times for her benefit, Louisa began to wonder whether Liam had already come home that afternoon. And if he had, what had he overheard? There had been a noise, enough to penetrate Robert’s consciousness, enough to stop him in mid-flow and make him look round the corner. They had gone together into the front garden, even glanced along the towpath, but apart from the gate standing open, there was no sign of anyone. At the time it had been disturbing, but inexplicable. Shortly afterwards, hardly on better terms, Robert had said he must go.
With awful dread that their mysterious visitor may have been Liam, Louisa had tried to find a way of telling Edward, but she had been reluctant to provoke harsh words over Robert’s illicit visit while her other son was in the house. At last Robin went out, but then Tisha arrived home with a girlfriend, and they had clung maddeningly to the garden, discussing the latest fashions and people at work in girlish, affected voices.
Wishing them far enough, Louisa was astonished to hear her garden being praised by the friend, and Tisha saying airily that yes, it was wonderful to have this touch of rural peace, so much pleasanter than living in town. Ordinarily, Louisa would have smothered a laugh at such affected nonsense, but in that moment she could have smacked Tisha for her insincerity and that desire to impress. Usually, she was inordinately keen to keep her friends on their home ground, rather than her own.
The friend eventually went home just as Robin returned. Touchingly concerned about his brother, he had offered to go out again, but Liam could have gone in any direction, and Louisa was far from convinced that he would return at all. Keeping her voice light, she had sent her younger son to bed half an hour ago, but still had not broached the subject to Edward.
At her sigh, Edward turned. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said gently, ‘he will be back. And even if he decides to stay out all night, he can’t come to much harm. It’s hardly the middle of winter.’
Twisting a handkerchief between her fingers, Louisa shook her head. ‘It’s not that.’ She took a deep breath. ‘Something else is worrying me. I think he might have come back this afternoon, when...’
The sound of footsteps on the path halted her in mid-sentence; she dashed into the kitchen while Edward slowly pushed back his chair.
She stood like someone frozen to the spot. As he strode quickly to her side, Edward immediately saw why. In shadows cast by the oil-lamp, Liam stood against the closed door, his eyes glittering feverishly, his face suffused. At first Edward thought he was drunk, but then he moved, and in the light his brows and thick, tumbled hair gleamed in contrast to his sunburned skin.
Without uttering a word the boy went to the sink, turned on the tap and cupped his hands beneath it, drinking like someone dying of thirst, splashing the rest over face and neck. As though a spell had been broken, Louisa grabbed a pint pot from the shelf, and as she handed it to him, touched his head and neck. Her gentle fingers might have been those of a torturer: as he flinched away, Liam told her harshly to leave him alone.
‘I won’t hurt you,’ his mother protested, reaching out again, ‘I only want to feel if you have a temperature...’
‘What if I have? It’s no business of yours. Get away – don’t touch me.’
Gingerly dabbing his face with a towel, he backed out of reach. But he need not have bothered, Edward thought; holding the sink for support, Louisa was staring as though Liam had struck her physically. For a second, Edward wanted to hit him, wanted to grab him by the collar and kick him up the stairs to bed. But the boy was obviously ill, his behaviour so completely out of character that Edward knew he must be calmed, not provoked.
‘If you’re not feeling well, Liam,’ he said quietly, drawing out a couple of chairs, ‘why don’t you sit down and tell us where you’ve been?’ Ignoring him for the moment, he turned to Louisa and gently persuaded her into a chair. Drawing out another, Edward seated himself and repeated his suggestion.
‘Obviously,’ he went on, ‘you’ve been in the sun all afternoon – not very wise, as I’m sure you’ll agree. But that’s the penalty you’re paying for going off half-cocked. Next time, perhaps you’ll remember it.’
Dropping the towel, Liam started to laugh. It was a harsh, mirthless sound which seemed to hurt him even more than it hurt them to hear it. ‘Oh, I’m not likely to forget this afternoon,’ he said with bitter irony. ‘Rest assured, Father, I’ll remember it to my dying day!’
‘What do you mean?’ Edward whispered, his heart plummeting in sudden fear. He glanced at Louisa, ashen-faced with shock, and knew, instantly, that something had occurred which had nothing to do with the argument in Coffee Yard. ‘What does he mean?’ he demanded of her, but with eyes only for Liam, she merely shook her head.
‘Didn’t you tell him?’ Liam demanded. ‘Didn’t you tell him who was here this afternoon and what you were discussing? Didn’t you say you were talking about me and Georgina – and that he told you it was time you told the truth?’’
By the ghastliness of their faces, Liam knew he had managed to stun them both, knew he had the upper hand for once, and the knowledge gave him a sense of tremendous power. Outside, the child which remained in him had quaked at the temerity of a frontal attack, but a lover’s pain and a man’s anger had smothered its mewling voice; that sense of power killed it outright. He wanted to hurt them, as much as he had been hurt, and was prepared to give no quarter.
‘Tell me,’ he asked conversationally of his mother, ‘has the Colonel always been your lover, or did you give him up on your wedding day?’
‘That’s enough,’ Edward hissed, thrusting himself between the two and forcing Liam back. ‘This is your mother, for heaven’s sake! Have you no respect?’
There were no denials, Liam noted. Something else in him died. Less than a foot from the man who had been his father, Liam drew himself up to his full height. He had the advantage of four or five inches. Looking down into Edward’s face, noting its greyness, its anger and distress, Liam felt no pity at all.
‘I have no respect,’ he declared implacably, ‘for either of you.’
The older man seemed to shrink before his eyes. Sagging backwards against the table, he slowly shook his head.
‘Oh, my God,’ he murmured under his breath, ‘what have we done?’ Like someone in a dream, he turned to his wife. ‘Robert was here, then? Today? Why didn’t you tell me?’
She answered faintly: ‘I don’t know. I should have – I tried to...’ With a great effort she rose to her feet, taking a step towards Liam, her hand extended like a beggar. ‘I’m sorry,’ she cried as he jerked away. ‘Liam, love, I’m sorry! It wasn’t intended – we didn’t know you were there – I don’t know what you heard, but – ’
‘Spare me your excuses! Try the truth for a change. Why didn’t you tell me before? Why did you let me go on believing something that wasn’t true?’ His mother winced and he enjoyed it, letting his voice gather power as the words rushed out in a torrent. ‘Everything I believed in is lies – everything. There’s nothing left — my life is destroyed. You’ve taken it all away and made a fool of me. I loved you – I loved my father, but he’s not my father at all. I loved Georgina, too – stupidly, ridiculously, hopelessly, but still I loved her.
‘But I didn’t know,’ he whispered, ‘I didn’t know she was my sister...’ There was a hard pain in his chest and in his throat, a pain which might have found ease in tears, but he forced it down, determined not to give way.
‘She should never have come here,’ Edward murmured distractedly.
‘So your lies could have gone unchallenged?’
‘No – so your pain could have been avoided! That was all your mother ever wanted – to spare you and Robin and Tisha the agony of knowing you were the children of a man she could never marry!’
‘Oh, yes, I forgot,’ Liam said with something akin to a sneer, ‘he was married, Mother, wasn’t he? So you added the sin of adultery to that of fornication – and then married your cousin in an attempt to cover it up!’ Hating her for being so much less than perfect, for destroying his image of her as a mother and as a woman, Liam never noticed the hand Edward raised against him. The fist which crashed into his jaw sent him staggering sideways, and as he flung out an arm to save himself, brought down a shelf full of crockery.
There was a second crash as Robin burst into the kitchen, sending the door juddering against its hinges, then a moment’s horrified silence. As Liam gathered himself together, ready to strike back, Robin leapt forward, pinioning his arms, urging him to come away, not to make things worse. Sparing barely a glance for his anguished mother, or his father massaging painful knuckles, the younger boy dragged Liam out of the room.
Tisha was sitting halfway up the stairs, knees tucked beneath her chin, eyes huge in a pale, shocked face. She seemed to be staring at nothing, made no response to her brother’s request, and even as Robin brushed past, pulling Liam with him, she did not move.
Gruffly, from the top of the stairs, he told her to go to bed; but for the moment he was more concerned with his brother, who, on the point of collapse, was bleeding profusely from a cut lip. In their shared bedroom Robin poured water into a basin and silently bathed his brother’s face. With no assistance he stripped off Liam’s clothes and made him lie down in the big bed they had shared since childhood. Although it was many years since they had wrapped their arms around each other in sleep, when Robin climbed in he curled around his older brother.
Tisha did not stir. She listened to her mother’s sobs and her father’s pleas, his bitter, anguished recriminations, which were directed as much against himself as anyone else. It was frightening to hear her calm, assured, beloved father so distressed, and awful to realize his vulnerability. She heard her mother crying over Liam, repeating his name like a litany; a chair scraped on the stone floor below, there was a scuffle of feet, a cry from her mother and more muffled sobs. Tisha’s heart hardened. Liam was her mother’s favourite and always had been. She would grieve for him and less for Robin, but not at all for her daughter.
Robert Duncannon’s name was repeated several times, and it slowly dawned on Tisha that the witty, handsome army officer she so admired was, in fact, her father. She realized too that Edward hated him. For the moment, however, that was less important than her need to be comforted. The secure world she so enjoyed kicking against was suddenly no more: she was suspended in a yawning, echoing void and nobody seemed aware of it. Obsessed with their own misery, her parents cared nothing for Tisha’s, while Robin and Liam had each other, and would not welcome her.
She heard Edward telling her mother to come to bed. With a cold hand round her heart, Tisha crept silently away.
Overtaken by exhaustion, neither Edward nor Louisa had the heart to face their children then. ‘Tomorrow,’ Edward said as he helped her to undress, ‘we must sort it out tomorrow. Things will seem different in the morning.’
‘Do you hate me?’ she asked as they lay together between the linen sheets.
‘How could I hate you,’ he whispered into the darkness, ‘when I’ve loved you from the moment you were born?’ He drew her, unresisting, into his arms, wiping away the tears with gentle, loving hands. He kissed her forehead as she nestled against him, knowing, in spite of everything, that Louisa needed him and always would. His bitterness and resentment were reserved for Robert Duncannon, not through jealousy, but because he had always known his capacity for destruction. And now those fears were fact.
Seeking words which would comfort her, Edward looked back over the years. Linked by the closeness of their blood relationship, the two lives seemed one. It was ironic, Edward thought, that those close links should have made his feelings for her seem so incestuous, to the extent that he had not declared himself, and subsequently lost her to Robert Duncannon. That was his biggest regret. And now the appalling irony was that Liam should fall in love with Robert’s daughter, not knowing the incestuous nature of his feelings for her.
Feeling the boy’s pain, regretting the fury which had prompted him to strike out, nevertheless Edward had to admit to a certain sense of relief. Horrible though that scene had been, now at least things were out in the open. He would not have wished it so, and his regrets were legion when he thought of the past’s lost opportunities, but always he had been bound by Louisa’s desire for secrecy. Edward knew he should have overridden her, that things should never have been allowed to come to this pass; but they were, after all, Louisa’s children, and he their father in name only. However, he had loved them as though they were his own, and in retrospect was able to understand the tension which had made him so short-tempered in recent months: a need to speak to Liam, to tell him the truth, conflicting with his loyalty to Louisa.
He did not blame her for the afternoon’s sequence of events, or if he did, he blamed himself in equal measure. Knowing the depth of her love for her eldest child, and understanding, too, her propensity for guilt, he was more deeply concerned for her than he was for the children. He felt for them, for Liam particularly. But they were young and had always been loved, and he was sure their hearts would mend. Where his wife was concerned, he was not so sure. In the old days, before they were married, she had suffered greatly. Edward did not want her to suffer like that again.
Tomorrow, he thought, when the sun was up, would be the time to gather themselves and talk honestly and openly about the past – his own as well as Louisa’s — and then, hopefully, they could begin to discuss the future.
Liam awoke with a shaft of sunlight in his eyes, just after half-past four. His head was throbbing and his mouth was sore, proving, if proof were needed, that yesterday’s events were real. Wincing with pain and unbidden memory, he turned away from the light. On the pillow beside him, innocent in sleep, Robin’s face was curiously unmarked by the grief which had broken in the hours of darkness.
Although they were different, and might not have chosen each other as friends, Liam was never more aware of the bonds which existed between them. But that was another pain he did not want to feel. For a moment he acknowledged the debt he owed to his brother. Without his intervention, Liam knew he might have done unforgivable, irretrievable damage. The grief they had shared afterwards, the tortured questions he had answered, Liam thrust aside. He would not dwell on that, just as he would not think of yesterday.
With sleep, thank God, the torture had subsided, leaving him cold and empty and capable of thought. Now was the time to go, before claims were made upon him, before apologies and explanations and other people’s pain could screw him down with guilt. Liam knew, as surely as the sun had risen and would duly set, that to be forced into Georgina’s presence after this, would be the most unbearable agony a man could imagine. He saw her eyes smiling at him, imagined her hair loose and tumbling about her face; thought of that supple, slender figure, and knew he would always want her. No matter who she was or what she was, however misplaced his heart, he would always, always love her. But he could not face her pity.
Trying not to wake his brother, Liam rolled out of bed and stifled a groan. He was hurting all over, muscles aching, skin tender, head throbbing. Dried blood had caked his lips together and left his mouth tasting foul. He felt physically and mentally soiled, and surveyed yesterday’s stained and crumpled clothes with distaste. Opening a drawer with great care, he found two sets of clean linen, and taking his suit and a spare pair of trousers from the wardrobe, crept downstairs to wash in the kitchen.
Stuffing the spare clothing into a knapsack, together with his razor and a cake of soap, he added half a loaf of bread and some cheese, and slipped his post office savings book into an inner pocket. That, together with this week’s unspent allowance, might pay for meals and a few days’ cheap lodgings. He must trust to fortune for the rest. Knotting his tie, he slipped on his jacket and glanced in the mirror to give his hair a final brush. It was wet, but several shades lighter than his skin. Although his lower lip was bruised and swollen, the cut was much less noticeable. All in all, he thought dispassionately, he looked better than he felt, which as far as a prospective employer was concerned, was all that mattered. He hoped his journey would pass without incident.
With his hand on the door, Liam remembered something; for a moment he wavered, but need won. He went to Robin’s neat stack of photographs on the sideboard, flicked through them and found a set of portraits, postcard-sized, of members of the family. They had been isolated and enlarged from the group photographs, and there were several of each: just one, surely, would not be missed.
Guiltily, hearing a movement above, Liam pushed that portrait of Georgina between the leaves of his savings-book and rearranged the others into neatness. He hurried into the hall just as Robin came down the stairs. He was fully dressed.
Liam stood for a moment, saying nothing, then jerked his head. ‘If you want to talk,’ he murmured, ‘you’d better come outside.’
They walked around the house on the grass, and opening the gate, Liam blessed the fact that he had cured its tortured squeak; it did not occur to him that had he left it alone, his mother and Robert Duncannon might have been warned of his approach, and thus not blighted his hopes so abruptly.
Liam led the way to where he had left his bike the night before. Some instinct had made him hide it in the hedge rather than run the risk of having it taken from him and locked away. As he pulled it free of twigs and branches, Robin asked what his plans were.
‘I’m leaving York, looking for another job, something entirely different. I’m not going to say what and where, because if you know, as I said last night, they’ll worm it out of you, and probably come looking. I don’t want that. Not yet, anyway,’ he amended, seeing his brother’s crestfallen glance. ‘Once I get a place, I’ll be in touch.’
‘Why can’t we go together?’
Liam looked up, taking in Robin’s unruly dark hair, the thin, pale face. He was tougher than he looked, but still Liam knew his intention would not suit the younger boy. He might well regret it, probably for the rest of his life. ‘Don’t be stupid. You’ve got a good job, you’ll do well at it. I don’t think you’d care for what I intend to do.’
‘And what’s that?’
‘Ask no questions, and you’ll be told no lies.’
Standing four-square across the sandy path, Robin gave a snort of disgust. ‘Then you’re as bad as they are.’
‘Shut up!’ Liam hissed. ‘Do you want to wake the whole house?’ He grasped the handlebars of his bike with a purpose, and told his brother to move. ‘Let me go, before somebody comes out and tries to stop me.’
‘I shall leave anyway,’ Robin announced stubbornly. ‘I was thinking about it last night. I’m going to join up.’
‘Well, that’s a bloody stupid thing to do. You’ll get nowhere in the army.’
‘It’ll get me away from here.’
‘Please yourself then,’ Liam muttered harshly. ‘Make your own mistakes, but you’re not coming with me.’
Pressing forward on the pedals, he edged his brother out of the way. ‘Say goodbye to Tisha for me.’ He turned again and paused. ‘Tell her – tell her I’m sorry, won’t you?’
‘What for?’
‘I don’t know. Everything, I suppose.’
‘What if I see Georgie?’
‘Nothing,’ Liam whispered, turning away. ‘Nothing at all.’
Out there on the towpath, neither of them noticed the face at the window of their bedroom. A pair of blue eyes, fringed with dark lashes, watched their goodbyes with a mixture of envy and pain. Tisha had lain awake all night, listening to whispered words and the creaks of the old house. She had waited in vain for someone to come and comfort her. Nobody came, not even her father, whose favourite she had always been. But he was not her father anymore, so maybe that explained it. She saw her younger brother watching as Liam rode away, and was relieved that he was not going too. As Robin came into the house she went back to her own room, determined to pretend to be asleep. Pride would not let her admit to anyone that she had suffered from their neglect.
In warm, early morning sun, Liam rode past empty cattle pens outside the Walmgate walls, and by the massive barbican turned right onto the broad highroad which led across the East Riding and ultimately to the busy port of Kingston-upon-Hull. By the side of the road, a scuffed and worn mounting block announced a distance of 37 miles. A long way, but if he was lucky, Liam thought, pushing his hat firmly onto his head, he would reach the port before the sun touched the meridian. A sudden sense of his momentous decision made him turn and look back. The old walled city was beginning to stir to yet another day: it did not seem the slightest bit dismayed by his defection.
White limestone defences gleamed in the sun, and the Minster’s towers soared into the blue; below stood Coffee Yard, and strangely, at the thought of it, Liam could have wept for all that he was leaving behind.
But York was part of the past, and for him the past must be a closed book. It was time to press on towards the rest of his life. There would be a berth, no doubt, on some tramp steamer, shipping out of Hull; he could work his passage to somewhere. Destinations, at the moment, were irrelevant.