Caroline sat in a comfortable armchair in Edward Endicott’s study and gave up on reading her novel. She had helped herself to a small gin earlier, and now she drained the glass and poured another. The old house creaked and settled itself around her after the hot summer’s day. Through the French windows she made out the flicker of bats in the light of the patio. Distantly she heard the high, sharp bark of a fox.
She laid her book aside and thought about Edward. She supposed that, from the point of view of the ferrety little inspector, Montgomery, it did look suspicious that Edward should have disappeared from the scene around the time that Stafford was murdered. But the police were in ignorance of Edward’s relationship with the satanist: it was absurd even to contemplate for one second that Edward should kill off the man he had become interested in over the course of the past few weeks. No, they would release him when they realized they were barking up the wrong tree.
She wondered what Edward would do now that his muse was no longer around to occupy him. She smiled to herself when she realized that perhaps nothing much would change; Edward would continue with his book and research Stafford’s life, albeit without the man himself to aid in that research.
She was glad that Donald and Maria were around. They were the kind of people, she thought, who might, given time and the right circumstances, become good friends. Donald was humorous and down to earth, spoke plainly and without affectation, and concealed a practical intelligence behind his banter. And Maria was by turns droll and as sharp as a scalpel. It was clear that the couple were very much in love and, while Caroline found that refreshing to see, there was nevertheless a part of her that could not help but be jealous. It was hard to watch people who were in love, and whose love was reciprocated, without resenting the fact that this was denied her.
She sipped her gin, told herself to buck up her ideas, and resumed reading.
Fifteen minutes later the front door opened and she sat up in anticipation of Edward’s arrival. The study door was open a fraction; he would see the light on and come to see who was burning the midnight oil. When the door did open, however, it was not Edward who appeared but Alasdair.
He blinked. ‘Oh, Caroline.’
‘I hope you don’t mind? I couldn’t go home with Edward being taken away for questioning like this … It is OK if I stay until he gets back?’
‘By all means. I thought he’d be back by now.’ He hesitated by the door. ‘They’ll release him tonight, won’t they?’ He moved to the overstuffed sofa on the opposite side of the hearth from her and sat down.
‘Of course they will,’ she said. ‘They don’t have a thing on him. He might have gone missing when Stafford was killed, but …’ She gestured. ‘They can’t pin a motive on him and there were no witnesses.’
‘But there were no witnesses, according to my father, to say that they saw him out hiking over the weekend.’
She smiled. ‘The onus is on the police to prove his guilt, not for Edward to prove his innocence. Believe me, you have nothing to worry about. Edward wouldn’t do anything like … like that, even in anger. Anyway,’ she went on, changing the subject, ‘where have you been till almost midnight?’
He coloured suddenly and stammered something about taking a constitutional.
‘Alasdair, you can be honest with me. How’s Marcus?’
He looked up quickly and said, ‘What …? I mean, why do you ask?’
‘Edward mentioned that you two were friends.’
He turned, if this were possible, an even deeper shade of scarlet and stared down at his fingers. ‘We’ve known each other a long time,’ he said. ‘We are good friends.’
She took a sip of gin, regarding him. ‘Despite the fact that you hold diametrically opposite views on the fundamentals of existence?’
A smile flickered on his thin face. ‘That doesn’t seem to get in the way,’ he said.
She laughed. ‘No, the idea that couples should be philosophically compatible is vastly overrated, in my opinion. What matters is that there should be a meeting of the soul.’
Alasdair sat on the sofa, frozen, like a rabbit caught in the headlights of a car. ‘You don’t … don’t disapprove of … of …’
‘Of you and Marcus? Good God, Alasdair, life is short enough, and love and affection hard enough to find without worrying who might approve of it or disapprove. I’ve lived long enough to know that you should grasp the opportunity when it comes, and damn the naysayers to hell. But just listen to me! I sound like a maiden aunt dispensing second-hand wisdom!’ Or a frustrated middle-aged woman wishing that she could take her own advice, she thought.
He smiled. ‘I don’t know … It’s so damnably difficult, Caroline.’
‘I can imagine.’
‘Marcus is torn in two, mentally. That damned Church of his, its outmoded morality … It disgusts me!’ He looked up from his knotted hands. ‘Did you know that he’s on drugs to help him get through the day?’
‘Drugs?’
‘Oh, prescription drugs. Some kind of antidepressant. He presents such a positive face to the world nobody would believe what he’s going through. He comes over as so bright and alive when the reality is that he’s tortured inside.’
‘I don’t know what to say, Alasdair. Stand by him. That’s all you can do, really. Be there for him and don’t give a damn what the world thinks or says, which might be easy for me to say, but still …’
He smiled at her, then sighed and looked at the carriage clock on the mantelshelf. ‘My word, is that the time? I’d better be turning in. I take it you’ll be going to Dent’s show?’
She laughed without humour. ‘I expect I’ll be there to see what travesties of so-called art he’s foisting on the world now. Good night, Alasdair.’
She listened to the creak of floorboards as he walked back through the hallway and up the stairs. She glanced at the clock – it was almost midnight – and decided that another small gin would be permissible.
She would never, she thought as she sipped the drink, cease to be amazed at how small-minded people could be when it came to judging the relationships of others. She could only guess at the outraged reaction of villagers to the idea that their vicar might be conducting an illicit affair with another young man. She supposed that Edward himself was guilty of the same insular views, too; it was the one aspect of his character – his innate conservatism – that she found not to her liking.
The front door opened and slammed shut, and booted treads sounded down the hallway. There was no doubting, this time, that Edward had arrived home.
The study door swung open and Edward stared at her. ‘Carrie? Didn’t expect you to be here.’
And it’s wonderful to see you, too, she thought.
He was such a big man in every sense: big physically, in his marine flannels like some yachting captain just off the boat at Cowes, and big in that his presence seemed to fill the room no matter where he was. She recalled the first time she’d met him in Hollywood, at a small party thrown by a director to celebrate the start of a film shoot. Edward had entered the room and seemed immediately to dominate it with his genial English bonhomie. She had always thought that love at first sight was the retroactive illusion of incurable romantics, but she had been smitten from the second she’d set eyes on Edward Endicott.
She said, ‘I couldn’t stand the thought of going home with you still …’
He dropped into the sofa recently vacated by his son and said, ‘Be Mum and pour me a bloody big double, would you?’
She picked up the crystal decanter and poured a stiff whisky into a shot glass. ‘How did it go?’
He shrugged his big shoulders. ‘I suppose they were only doing their duty. And looking at it from their point of view, I admit it must look pretty rum. Me skedaddling like that, and then the corpse turning up.’
She hesitated, then said, ‘I must admit, I’m a little …’
He stared across at her. ‘Out with it, woman.’
‘Frightened,’ she finished.
‘Don’t be. The police are only doing their duty. I’m as innocent as a new-born, so don’t go crying on my account.’
She smiled. ‘Actually, I was thinking more of … of what Stafford might do.’ She looked up at him, then around her at the study, and shivered. ‘I don’t know … but don’t you ever get the feeling that … that he’s watching us?’
‘I know what you mean, old girl. Watching us from the other side. Well, if anyone is, it’d be Stafford. But I shouldn’t worry yourself on that score. He wouldn’t have any gripes with us, would he?’
‘Alasdair’s worried that Stafford was upset about something you might write about him.’
Edward shook his head. ‘Stafford never mentioned anything of the kind, and he thought you charming.’
This was news to her. ‘He did?’
‘Said as much once. “Charming and intelligent”, his exact words.’
What a hypocritical old cad Stafford had been, she thought.
She hugged herself, staring across at Edward as he nursed his whisky and contemplated his outstretched legs. She wanted to confess everything to him: her past, her big mistake – which somehow Vivian Stafford had found out about – but there would be no way that someone like Edward, with his rather restricted views on moral probity, would accept her after learning of her past indiscretions.
Another thing she wanted to confess to Edward, but thought it wise not to, was her meeting with Stafford on Saturday evening … and her threat to kill him.
She tried to suppress the thought.
She said, surprising herself, ‘I sometimes wonder where all this is leading, Edward.’
He blinked at her. ‘Come again?’
She shrugged. ‘This. Us. Me and you. Where is it leading?’
‘Don’t quite get your drift, Carrie.’
She sighed. He could be wilfully obtuse at times. ‘I’m talking about feelings, Edward. Our feelings. Mine for you. Yours for me.’ She wondered if it were the gin talking, prompting her to say things she had not said for years.
‘Oh. I see.’ He shifted uncomfortably.
She poured herself another drink, took a mouthful and went on: ‘How long have we known each other?’
‘Oh. Now let’s see …’ He seemed to perk up, now that she had stopped talking about awkward things like feelings and had moved on to more manageable, factual things like dates. ‘We met in late ’thirty-four, wasn’t it? Or was it ’thirty-five? So what’d that be? Twenty years. Almost twenty-one.’
‘Over twenty years …’ she murmured to herself in amazement. She’d been in her mid-thirties then, in her physical prime – and if she hadn’t been able to attract him then, she thought, what chance did she have now? Twenty years spent pining after a man who thought little or nothing of her … No, she chastised herself, that was unfair; she was sure that Edward did, in his own limited way, care a little for her.
‘Lot of water under the bridge,’ he said maddeningly.
‘And in all that time,’ she said, before she could stop herself, ‘all I’ve ever wanted is for us to be together like a normal, loving couple.’
He coloured suddenly, reminding her of his son. ‘Steady on, Carrie,’ he said as if chastising a recalcitrant horse.
She slammed down her glass on the arm of the chair. ‘I won’t “steady on”, dammit! I’ll say what I have to say. And it isn’t,’ she went on, staring at him, ‘as if I haven’t said all this before … or have you conveniently forgotten?’
‘Carrie …’ He stared at his feet, uncomfortable.
‘You know what I feel about you, Edward. Why can’t you at least acknowledge that?’
He looked across at her. ‘I’ve told you. After Mary. After what happened. I … I didn’t want to go through all that again.’
‘Edward, you can’t let an experience like that blight your life, your relationships! Christ, no one would ever grow, emotionally, if they let bad experiences sour everything they did.’
‘You don’t know what it was like. It was hell being married to her – and hell when she died. The guilt. I … I thought in some odd way that it was my fault, her dying like that. I thought my taking her off to the States as I did, against her will, somehow contributed to her illness.’
‘That’s ridiculous, Edward, and you know it.’
He shrugged. ‘Maybe, but it’s a fact. Once bitten …’
She sighed. That was another thing that angered her about him, his refuge in silly clichés and platitudes.
She said, ‘I’ve told you I was married briefly before I met you.’
‘That’s right. A cad. Beat you about, didn’t he?’
‘I thought I loved him. He was an actor. We met at drama school. He was young, handsome, caring, or so I thought at the time. Only when I started getting parts, became successful, he couldn’t handle it. He wasn’t really very good, and he resented my little talent, and my luck. He started drinking and turned violent.’
He muttered, ‘Must’ve been hellish, Carrie.’
‘Oh, it was. It was hellish having all my love spurned, turned against me, and then hellish falling out of love and feeling guilty.’
‘I’m sorry.’
She smiled. ‘What I’m trying to say, Edward, is that I didn’t let that bad experience make me bitter. I haven’t let it blind me to the possibility of finding someone, and when you came along … I know I’ve said this before, and I know you’ll just spurn me again … but I love you, and I wish you could find it in your heart to accept that and feel something for me in return.’
She stood up, and only when she did so did she realize how unsteady she was on her feet. She swayed a little, staring down at him. ‘Think about what I’ve said, Edward. I’m not asking that we marry, or even live together. Just that you … you respond.’
She stopped there, before she became angry and spoiled things even further. ‘I’ll see myself out.’
She was at the study door when he looked up and said, ‘Carrie, you know that I do care for you, in my own way.’
She smiled, tearfully, and slipped from the room.
She hurried from the Chase and down the gravelled drive. A full moon was out, illuminating the silent countryside. In your own way, she thought as she strode down the lane. Which was exactly the problem.
Somewhere off to her right, in the elms, an owl gave its lonely call.