Текст книги "The Return of the Gypsy"

Автор книги: Philippa Carr

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I hesitated and he went on: “There is so much I want to know about… my daughter.”

“I understand that, of course.”

I felt foolish, awkward … wanting so much to go with him and at the same time feeling it was unseemly to do so with so much enthusiasm. But why not? I was no longer a young girl, I was a married woman. They deserved certain privileges, certain freedoms. To refuse to go with him alone would have suggested that I suspected him of intending to make advances. Or would it? Sensing my hesitation he pressed home the point.

“What about a trip on the river? Some of the riverside inns are of the best. We could sit in the gardens and watch the world sail by. I always find that pleasant.”

I said I should be ready in ten minutes. I went to my mother’s room but her maid told me she had just gone out with my father. I was rather glad as I did not want her speculating.

I put on my cloak and came down.

He looked very elegant in his dark blue coat and light waistcoat and his hessian boots. In my dreams I had seen him in his brown breeches and orange coloured shirt. Even then he had had a certain style—gypsy fashion it was true, but he had been outstanding as he always would be.

I was beginning to feel happy for no reason at all except that I was in his company.

He took my arm as we walked through the streets towards the river. It was a lovely morning: the sun was warm and that ambience of victory still hung about the streets. Everyone seemed full of joy.

“I am so pleased I found you,” he was saying. He pressed my arm. “Of course I should have done so in due course. I was planning to come down to find you when I left London. How much more interesting this is! I little knew when I set out for the Inskips’ ball how much I was going to enjoy it.”

“Surprises are always appreciated.”

“Pleasant surprises, yes. Do you know, I have often thought of something like this, sauntering through the streets of London, a beautiful young lady on my arm, and the strange thing was that it was with one particular young lady … and here I am. In my mind’s eye I have seen it many times. Is that precognition, would you say?”

“Certainly not. Once you were in London you could easily have found a young lady to stroll with you. You must have been homesick during your stay abroad.”

“Homesick for a morning like this.”

“It is certainly a beautiful one and I suppose however far one roams one never forgets one’s native land.”

“The longing to return is always there.”

He turned his head to look at me. “I had a very special reason,” he said.

“Because you were a prisoner and you knew you could only walk again in the streets of London as a free man.”

“It was more than that.”

We had reached the river. He hired a boat and helped me in; then he picked up the oars and we were speeding past the banks, past the Tower of London and all the other craft on the river. There were people in boats, bent on enjoying themselves, laughing, shouting to each other, some singing, some swaying to the strains of violins.

“It will be quieter by Greenwich,” he said. “That is where I propose to take you. The White Hart. I went there long ago and was impressed. Of course, I was young then. Do you think it is wise to go back to the haunts of one’s youth?”

“Hardly ever. They become beautiful in retrospect. Then when you see them again they are less than you expected, because they remain the same as they always were.”

“I have an idea that the White Hart is going to be more delightful today than it ever was.”

“Don’t set your hopes too high. I should hate them to be disappointed.”

“That will not happen.”

“You’re tempting fate.”

“I have always tempted fate. Do you know, I have a sneaking feeling that fate likes to be tempted.”

“I don’t think that is the general opinion.”

“I was never one who went in for general opinions. I was always an individualist.”

“You must have been to leave home and live with the gypsies. How long were you with them?”

“About two years.”

“That’s quite a time.”

“It was a gesture of defiance. They were camping on our land. My brother and I were engaged in one of our quarrels. It would have been unusual if we had not been. These quarrels were part of our daily lives. He said, ‘You’re no better than those gypsies. It would suit you roaming about, getting nowhere, living aimlessly …’ I said to him, ‘Maybe you’re right. At least they live naturally.’ And then I went off and joined them. It was a stupid thing to do. I was eighteen at the time. One can do stupid things at eighteen.”

“Yes,” I said quietly, “one can.”

“Not you. You never would.”

“You do not know me.”

The boat had drawn up at some stairs. We alighted and he tied it up. “Here is the inn,” he said. “Right on the river. There are the gardens. We could sit out there and watch the craft on the river while we eat. It’s just as I remembered it.”

We climbed the slight incline to the inn and seated ourselves. A buxom girl in a mob cap and a low-cut bodice came out to attend to us. There were fish fritters, whitebait, cold beef and pigeon pie, she told us, with ale, home-brewed cider or real French wine to go with it.

“I wonder if it is Charlot’s burgundy,” I said. “That is my half brother who lives in France.”

“Let’s have it in honour of your half brother.”

“I must tell you about him,” I said.

We decided on the cold beef and it was served with hot potatoes in their jackets. The food was plain but delicious. I quickly told him about Charlot’s vineyard and how now the war was over and Napoleon finally defeated, I expected we should be visiting him now and then.

He listened attentively, then he said: “It is so good to be here with you.”

I flushed a little and gave my attention to the beef.

“I want to talk to you about my experiences. Do you know, I have never talked about them much.”

“Won’t that bring back to your mind something you would rather forget?”

“Once I have told you I shall begin to forget. Can you imagine my feelings in that courtroom?”

“It is difficult to imagine something which has never happened to one, but I have a fair idea what it must have been like. Horrifying!”

“I trust you will never come so close to death as I did.”

“We all have to come close to it some day.”

“When we are old it is inevitable, yes, but not when it is decided by others that it is time you left the Earth. I used to lie in my cell and wonder. The uncertainty was hard to bear. I used to say to myself, This time next year, where shall I be? Shall I be on Earth or in the realms of the unknown?”

“Don’t speak of it.”

“I shall tell you once and then never again refer to it. There I was in the courtroom. I believed I was going to be condemned to death. To be hanged by the neck is so ignoble … so undignified. No man should be subjected to that humiliation. That was what I cared about… the degradation … not losing my life. I’ve risked that often enough.”

“You must put it out of your mind.”

“I will, so I’ll go back to the moment when I knew I was going to live. I had not realized before how very sweet life is. To live … but as a slave … seven years of servitude in a foreign land. But for a time I rejoiced. As I said, life is sweet.”

“Tell me about Australia,” I said.

“I shall never forget my first glimpse of Sydney Harbour. We had been battened down in the hold for the voyage. We did not know whether it was night or day. There were the terrible hours at sea when the ship pitched and tossed. People were ill and some died. The sea was beautiful but we only saw it when we were taken up on deck for an hour’s exercise each day. There we were roped together… thieves, vagabonds, murderers, men who had been guilty of poaching a pheasant, stealing a handkerchief or writing something which was not approved of. All of us together … the seven year men, the fourteen year men and the lifers. There were times when I wished your good father had not intervened on my behalf and I was sure it was more comfortable dangling from a rope than living in that hell.”

I put my hand across the table and touched his. The response was immediate. He grasped my hand.

I said: “I am very sorry. I wish I could have helped you escape from Grasslands that day.”

“If I had I should have been a hunted man for the rest of my days. Now you see me free. I have served my sentence. I am at liberty. I was fortunate. I could have been in a chain gang.”

I shivered.

“Imagine that. Guarded by troops when at work, never having the chains removed from one’s legs … living in a stockade with a hundred other wretches. But why am I telling you this? This was to be a happy day.”

I said: “I think you want to talk of it… just once. Relieve your mind and then try to forget. Have you talked of it often?”

“No. There is no one to whom I wish to speak. It is different with you. You were my friend … right from the day when you came upon me in that house.”

“I thought it was so unfair. You had killed that man who deserved to be killed. You had saved Leah … and for that you were hunted … called a criminal.”

“Now let me tell you of my good fortune. We came up and there before us was that wonderful harbour. How can I describe it to you … all those inlets, the sandy beaches fringed with foliage. It was quite splendid and one’s spirits rose to contemplate it… The hot sun, the fragrance in the air, the magnificent birds … cockatoos, parrots … of the most dazzling colours. It must have looked a little different from when Cook first saw it for now buildings were visible, little houses which had been built by the settlers, low hills, gullies and the bush in some parts coming to the water’s edge. When one has been cooped up for months it is a glorious feeling to look at all that beauty, to take deep breaths of that wonderful air and suddenly to feel how good it is to be alive.

“We were in the ship a few days before we were chosen by those who would be our masters for the term of our sentence. An advertisement would have appeared in the newspapers to say that a cargo of prisoners had arrived for selection. We were taken on deck and there we stood while our prospective owners came and inspected us. I can tell you that was one of the most humiliating moments of my life. We were like cattle. But I distress you again and I want to tell you of my good fortune. I was selected by a grazier who had a small station some miles out of New South Wales. He was not a bad man. He wanted a good worker. I was young and strong and I was to serve a seven years’ term, which was an indication that I was not a hardened criminal.

“Joe Cleaver selected me and from that moment I began to feel a little more like a human being. It was not an easy life. I began to realize how comfortably I had lived during my twenty years. But I was not averse to work. In fact I welcomed it. I was given blankets and I slept in a hut which I shared with two others. There we prepared our food and boiled our water in billy cans. Eight pounds of beef a week, ten pounds of flour; and a quart of milk a day—that was our ration. And we laboured from dawn to sunset. It was a hard life but I began to like it. Joe Cleaver noticed me because I had introduced him to one or two methods of work which produced good results. Within a year I was sleeping in the house. He consulted me now and then.”

I nodded. I could well imagine it. He would be noticed wherever he was.

“The months passed … the years passed … all seven of them and I was free. Joe didn’t want me to go. He gave me a strip of land and helped me. I had a few sheep. Then I had more sheep. Joe said I would be a lucky grazier. He reckoned in no time I would have a station of my own. Then the news came. They had traced me. My brother had died and I had inherited my family’s estate and title.”

“So you left what you were building up and came home.”

“Yes, I came home.”

“You will go back to Australia?”

“I think I may one day. You would be interested to see the place?”

“I am always interested to see new places.”

“It changes all the time. It grows. I saw it grow in the years I was there. Joe used to take me into Sydney with him. He said I had a way of bargaining which he lacked. I supposed I was more articulate, more shrewd perhaps. Joe and I became very good friends. What was I saying … Yes, a growing town. There are streets where once there were cart tracks. There are so many natural assets. Yes, I should like to go back.”

“What of the land you have there?”

“I put a man in charge of it, so I must go back one day.”

“Not to stay.”

“No. My home is in England … in Cornwall. Do you know Cornwall?”

I shook my head.

“You would like it. It is different from the rest of England. It’s closer to nature. It isn’t that only. The Cornish are a superstitious race. There is something there … something fey. You who are so practical, so full of good sense would be sceptical perhaps.”

“I fear I am not so full of common sense as you appear to think.”

“I am sure you are.”

“How could you be sure? You hardly know me.”

“I know a good deal about you.”

“You met me when I was a child more or less … and then nothing more until last night.”

“You have never been far from my thoughts since our first meeting.”

I laughed lightly. “Gallantry, I suppose,” I said. “The sort of thing men feel they must say to women.”

“The truth,” he insisted. “Do you know, when I was battened down in that loathsome place I could soothe my fury against fate by thinking of that bright-eyed little girl who was so earnest, so eager and who had saved my life. One never forgets someone who saved one’s life.”

“You exaggerate.”

“Indeed not.”

“I didn’t save your life. My father did what he could.”

“Because you insisted. Penfold told me everything. He came to the docks to see me off before I left.”

“I felt responsible.”

“Because you were followed to the house. Yes, you sustained me during those days. And then afterwards when I was living in my hut I would think of you. I used to say to myself, One day I am going to be free and I shall go back and find her. She will be grown up then …”

“Did you ever think of Dolly?”

“Now and then. Poor Dolly.”

“I should have thought she might have been the one in your thoughts.”

“Dolly? She was there … and she was gone. I think she felt like that of me.”

“Do you think a girl like Dolly would indulge in a light relationship, a sensation of an hour and then think no more of it? Dolly never knew a man before you, nor after you. Dolly was no light o’ love to be picked up and thrown aside.”

“It happened. She understood. She knew I was going away. It was that sort of relationship. There was never intended to be anything permanent… on either side.”

“I find that difficult to understand.”

“Of course you do. But for the child it would have been of very little moment.”

“I do not think it was for Dolly, but then of course she is a member of that sex which is born to serve the other.”

He smiled at me. “How fierce you are in defence of women. You are just as I knew you would be. But I never thought I should come back and find you … married.”

“Why not? I am not a child any more. I shall soon be twenty-one.”

“Seven years … eight years … it’s a long time out of a life. Tell me about your marriage. Are you happy?”

“I am happy.”

“But not completely so?”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because I sense it.”

“I could not have a kinder husband.”

“You have told me very little about him. He had an accident. That is all I know.”

“Before that accident I was engaged to marry him.”

“Were you very much in love?”

I hesitated. I did not know why I had to be entirely frank with him.

“You weren’t,” he said. “Then why did you marry him?”

“Amaryllis had become engaged, and I suppose I thought it was time I did. They all wanted me to marry Edward … his family and mine.”

“Rich, I suppose? Of good family,” he said ironically.

“Not particularly rich. Comfortable, with a business in Nottingham … good solid people, honourable. My family liked them. As a matter of fact, but for you we should never have known them.”

He looked surprised.

“It was when we went to Nottingham … when you stood on trial… that we met them. They became friendly and they bought Grasslands when Dolly died. They became our neighbours as well as friends.”

“So you became engaged because Amaryllis did?”

“It was something like that. Then there was this terrible accident. Edward was so brave … so wonderful. He wanted to free me but I wouldn’t have it. So we were married.”

“It is no life for you,” he said.

“It is the life I have chosen.”

“You were not meant to live a nun’s life. You are a vibrant person, full of life.”

“Were you meant to be treated like a slave? What do you mean when you say it is not what I was meant for? Clearly we are meant for what befalls us.”

“I could not help what happened to me. Could I have stood by and seen Leah ravished?”

“Could I stand by, having given my promise, and leave Edward because he had been crippled?”

“You do the most quixotic things. The idea of tying yourself for life because of a gesture!”

“And what of you? The idea of coming near to death and then suffering seven years of servitude … just for a young girl.”

“Would you say we were a pair of fools?”

“I can only say that what I did I had to do. And I believe the same applies to you.”

He took my hand and held it. “What a serious meeting this has been. I meant it to be so happy, so full of fun … meeting after all these years. We should be enjoying our reunion.” He filled my glass with the burgundy. He lifted his. “Come, laugh and be merry.”

I was surprised at the manner in which he could throw off his melancholy. Now he was very much like the laughing gypsy I had known long ago.

He told me about his estates in Cornwall and so vividly did he talk that I could picture the old grey stone mansion with the battlemented towers, with its long gallery—“haunted, you know. No house in Cornwall is worthy of the term ancient unless it has its ghost. We’re not far from the moors and we have the sea as well. I hope you will visit it one day.”

I let myself believe I would. He had that effect on me. He transported me into a world of make-believe. He made me feel young and carefree. I could temporarily forget that I had duties and responsibilities. I saw myself going through that house in Cornwall, marvelling in the long gallery, the solarium, the crown post, the priest’s hole, the great hall and the garden full of azaleas and rhododendrons with hydrangeas, pink, blue and white, growing in profusion.

He was a vivid talker and brought it all to life for me; moreover he made me long to be there to see it for myself.

I was brought back to reality by the realization that time was passing. My family would wonder where I was and I must go back.

Reluctantly we returned to the boat and I was a little sad as we rowed back. I had been indulging in dreams and as I came out of them I realized as never before, what a rash act it had been to marry Edward. When I looked at this man, pulling at the oars, smiling at me in a significant manner, all the melancholy I had seen in his face when he had talked of his trials disappeared. I was stirred as I never had been before. I wanted to go on being with him. I wanted to see that joy in living which he could display and which seemed particularly exciting when I heard of all he had endured during his years of servitude which would have been so hard to bear for a man of his nature.

In those moments on the river I said to myself: This must be falling in love. I had thought it would never happen to me, and now it had … too late.

We alighted from the boat and began the walk to the house. I realized it must be nearly three o’clock. I felt faintly irritated, frustrated. I had forgotten how anxious they would be about me, so completely absorbed had I been.

We came out into Piccadilly. I must have increased my pace a little, and he said: “You are anxious to get on.”

“I didn’t realize it was so late.”

“Let’s take this street. It’s a short cut.”

That was how I saw her. Recognition was instantaneous—after all she had made a great impression on me. It was the girl who had pretended to be blind.

How different she looked now! There was no doubt that she could see. She was fashionably dressed in rather a gaudy manner; her cheeks were startlingly red, the rest of her face very white; those eyes which had seemed so pathetically sightless were rimmed with kohl. She had crossed the road and gone into a building.

I said: “What place is that?”

Jake said: “It’s Frinton’s Club.”

“Frinton’s! I’ve heard of that. That was where Jonathan lost so much money. What sort of place is it?”

“It has rather a shady reputation, I believe.”

It was very strange. What was that girl doing in Frinton’s Club? Something should be done. I did not know what.

“Do you know who owns it?”

“It is said to be a Madame Delarge.”

“I’ve heard of her.”

“There are a chain of clubs like Frinton’s. I’ve heard all sorts of things go on in them. Not gambling only. They are the haunts of prostitutes and idle young men—and perhaps older ones—who have more money than sense.”

“I see.”

“There are a number of them in London. Madame Delarge is the accepted owner, but I have heard that she is just a name, and there is some big organization behind her. Frinton’s is just one of a chain of such clubs. Madame Delarge is the one behind whom the real owners cower. At least so I’ve heard.”

“Why should there be this need for anonymity?”

“It is rather an unsavoury business. It wouldn’t surprise me if the real owners are posing as pillars of society.”

I felt shaken. After my idyllic experience I had seen that young woman who for some time had haunted my dreams. To say the least, it was disconcerting.

When I told my parents I had seen the girl who had pretended to be blind and that she had gone into Frinton’s Club, my father said: “She’s obviously a loose woman. Many of them frequent those clubs. There’s nothing much we could do even if we approached the girl. It’s too long ago.”

“There is a woman who is said to own the place. A Madame Delarge.”

“Oh yes. She’s just a figurehead, I believe.”

“It was a great shock to see that girl. I should have known her anywhere although she was so dressed up and quite different. And her face …”

“Let’s hope she sticks to her trade,” said my father, “and doesn’t attempt any more to kidnap young innocent girls.”

“I think something ought to be done,” said my mother.

My father said to me: “Don’t you attempt to follow her if you see her again. Don’t do anything like that.”

“As if I should!”

My mother was more concerned about my going out with Jake Cadorson.

“I wondered where you were,” she said, mildly reproving.

“I came to tell you I was going but you were out. He wants to come down to see Tamarisk. I am not sure how Tamarisk will feel having a father suddenly presented to her.”

“She’s an unpredictable girl,” said my mother.

“I think,” I mused, “it will be best to break it to her gently. Then when she knows, I’ll ask him to come down.”

“We’ll have him at Eversleigh.”

“Why should you? Tamarisk is at Grasslands.”

My mother looked faintly embarrassed.

“I wondered …” she said.

She betrayed to me that she, who was very perceptive where I was concerned, had guessed that my feelings for this man were perhaps a little more intense than was desirable.

I said calmly: “I will ask him in due course.”

He called next day and my father asked him to dine with us. He accepted with alacrity. It was quite clear that my parents liked him. He had a special gratitude towards my father and quite openly they discussed the trial and the state of the country after this most devastating and prolonged war which had been going on.

“Twenty years one might say,” said my father. “The people are in a merry mood at the moment… singing the praises of the great Duke, but wait till the taxes are enforced. It will be a different story then.”

“You expect trouble?” asked Jonathan.

“I know there’ll be murmuring.” He turned to Jake. “I don’t know how things are in Cornwall.”

“Very much the same as in the rest of the country, I fear,” replied Jake. “And of course the people there are considerably poorer to start with.”

“We’ve had an example of what the mob can do,” said my mother. “Jessica’s husband has been a victim of that.”

“Yes, so I heard.”

“We are better off on our estates,” put in my father. “We manage to weather these storms. It’s townsfolk who suffer most.”

“In addition to the poverty engendered by the war, the people have another complaint,” said Jake. “They are demanding representation. They want universal suffrage.”

“It will be some time before we get that,” said my father. “Do we want every Tom, Dick and Harry who can’t read or write making the laws of this country?”

“They are not asking to make the laws,” I pointed out. “They are merely asking to have a voice in which man they send to Parliament to represent them.”

“Nonsense,” said my father. “The people have to learn. They have to accept what is. They have to march with the times.”

“I would say that is just what they are attempting to do,” I said.

“My daughter is a very contentious woman,” my father remarked to Jake. “Raise a point and she is bound to come up with the very opposite.”

“It makes life interesting,” said Jake.

I was glad they liked him. I was glad he fitted in so well.

After he had gone my father said: “Interesting fellow. Fancy entertaining an ex-convict at your table, Lottie. I’m surprised at you.”

“I found him better company than quite a number I could name.”

“Such experiences are bound to leave their mark. I’m glad things worked out the way they did. It would have been a tragedy to hang a man like that. He was only in that position because he’d saved a young girl from a drunken bully. Silly young idiot.”

“Why silly?” I said. “It was just the sort of thing you would have done in your youth.”

“My dear daughter, you flatter me. I never did much which was not going to bring me good.”

“Why do you always make yourself out to be so much worse than you are? You’re bad enough without that.”

We grinned at each other. I felt so happy because they all liked Jake Cadorson.

I did not think it could happen so soon.

We should be leaving London at the end of the week and it was a Wednesday. It was arranged that Jake should visit Grasslands one week after our return. That would give me time to break the news to Tamarisk that she had a father.

He had said there was so much he wanted to know about Tamarisk, and he confessed that he was a little nervous about meeting her.

It was afternoon. I wanted to go out and make a few purchases and when I left the house I met him. I believe he had been waiting for me.

“It seems so long since we have met,” he said.

I looked at him in astonishment. “It was yesterday.”

“I said it seemed a long time … not that it was.” He went on: “I want to talk to you. I have so much to say to you.”

“Still? I thought we had talked a lot.”

“Not enough. Let’s find somewhere quiet. I know. You have not seen my house yet. It isn’t very far.”

“I was going shopping.”

“Couldn’t that wait?”

“I suppose so. It wasn’t really important in any case.”

“I should like to show you my house. It is small by the standards of your family home. My brother used it as a pied á terre, and as he was a confirmed bachelor I suppose it sufficed.”

He took my arm and I felt as though I danced along those streets. The house was in a quiet little cul de sac. There was a row of Georgian houses with a garden opposite.

“It’s charming,” I said.

“Yes. My brother had elegant tastes and liked to indulge in the comforts of life.”

“Who looks after the house for you? Have you servants?”

“There is a basement in which live Mr. and Mrs. Evers. They as they say ‘do’ for me. It’s an excellent arrangement. Everything is looked after. Mrs. Evers is a good cook and their great virtue is that they don’t intrude. My brother taught them that. They appear like Aladdin’s genie when called on. Otherwise they remain tucked away with their lamp, which is of course in their basement apartment.”

“How fortunate you are. I often think we are plagued by our servants. They note everything we do, embellish it, garnish it and serve it up as salacious titbits.”

“I am free of such observation. It can be very comforting.”

He opened the door with a key and we stepped into the hall. There was a grandfather clock and an oak chest on which stood a big brass bowl, very highly polished. The silence was broken only by the ticking of the clock. I thought to myself: I ought not to have come.

He turned and faced me.

“It is a wonderful moment for me,” he said, “to have you here … in this house.”

“I’m longing to see it.”

“Here is the dining room and the kitchen, and on the next floor a drawing room and study, on the next two bedrooms. It is quite small, you see, but enough for my needs.”

“And you have the estate in Cornwall. I take it you will be living there most of the time.”

He took me up to the drawing room. It had big windows, reaching from floor to ceiling. The apple green drapes were trimmed with gold braid and the furnishings were a deeper shade of green. The furniture was elegant in the extreme.

“Let me take your cloak,” he said, and did so, throwing it over the back of a chair. We stood facing each other and suddenly he put his arms round me and kissed me.

For a moment I did not resist. I had forgotten everything in the acute pleasure such as I had never experienced before.

Then I withdrew myself trying to give the impression that what had passed between us was nothing more than a friendly greeting. It was a poor pretence.

He said: “It is no use trying to pretend this does not exist, is it?”

“What?” I retorted sharply.

“This—between us—you and me. It’s there, isn’t it? Wasn’t it there right from the beginning? You were only a child but I knew. Of course it seemed ridiculous then. You a little girl… Myself a man who had abandoned everything to go off with the gypsies. I can’t tell you how I regretted that when I saw you. Do you remember?”

“Well… vaguely. You were sitting under a tree wearing an orange shirt. You had a guitar. Do you still play it?”