A Taste for Nightshade (28 page)

 

 

On December the twenty-third, the park was hazy from clammy mists that muted and softened all colour and distance. Michael had not set off for Whitelow after breakfast, so I bundled myself into my redingote that was as thick and warm as a man's, and pulled on my sable hat and muff. Even so, the chill pinched my nose as I hurried along paths of mushy leaves, sending startled birds pink-pinking up into the air. Claw-like seed pods clung to my skirts; the fine flowers of summer drooped slimy and black. I collected a few posies of evergreens to paint: stiff pine cones, jewel-like berries of black and scarlet, and oval seed pods as lustrous as pearl.

I was roused from unpleasant thoughts by the unwelcome sounds of someone walking behind me on the path. I stopped and listened. There was a confidence and heaviness to those striding steps that made me sure a man was following me. I had left Michael with his feet on the fender and a pile of plans for the mill. Could it be a poacher? No, it was Michael, I was sure of it. ‘It is about saving your life, now,' Peg had said. I picked up my skirts, and hurried as fast and silently as I could towards the summerhouse. Once inside, I looked about for a hiding place and still fearing the tunnel, I slipped into the niche beside the statue of Harpocrates, and stood very still. Bless me with silence, I thought, and a phrase chimed in reply from the back of my mind: ‘Silence was their very god'. Of course; this must be where Moncrieff and Michael's mother had met. This must be where Michael was conceived.

Booted footsteps crunched on the broken tiles at the entrance; an unwelcome heat burned my cheeks. A confrontation with Michael out here, so far from the house, so far from Peg's help, filled me with terror. I glanced towards the low arch where the entrance to the tunnel lay, but it was too late to dash for it.

‘Grace? Are you there, Grace?' The voice was inside the summerhouse now. Once I would have mistaken it for Michael's, but now I knew better. Overjoyed, I stepped out from the niche.

‘Peter? You startled me.'

My brother-in-law was muffled in a greatcoat; as he spoke, white vapour rose from his lips. ‘I am not surprised, hiding out here in this broken-down place. Did you not hear me?'

‘I wasn't sure who you were,' I said, not caring to say I had mistaken him for his brother. ‘Did you call at the house?'

He pulled a sullen face. ‘Michael has forbidden me from calling. Extraordinary, isn't it? But I'm just on my way down from Ripon and I thought I might be able to search you out. An old servant sweeping the yard told me which direction you set off in.'

I ushered him towards the emerald-stained marble bench and settled before him in my painting chair. The light trickling in through the cracked panes was meagre and greenish too. ‘This is my private place. No one will find us here.'

‘Good.' He looked about himself, at the decay of the place, and pulled up his collar. ‘Grace, I have written to you twice this week of arrangements for you to join us in London. When you don't reply it alarms me. What is wrong?'

‘Forgive me. I should have replied to your invitation weeks ago. But as to further letters, I have received none at all.'

‘You will join us? I am not sure if you know, but Michael has quarrelled with Father.'

‘Over what matter?'

‘What do you think?'

I exhaled contemptuously. ‘Money?'

‘Naturally. But you are welcome to join us. We all expressly wish you to know that. There is a mail coach from here in Earlby, and I will meet you directly from it.'

I did not reply at once; precisely because I was powerfully tempted to join them.

‘It is hard,' I said, my tongue suddenly tied. Fear of Michael's fury were he to discover my betrayal hovered over me like Damocles' sword suspended on a horse's hair.

‘Peter, why did I not receive those letters?' I asked instead. Since Peg had confided in me, even the events surrounding my father's death had taken on a malign significance. ‘It is not the first time I have felt isolated by Michael. When I was ill he took it upon himself to direct my affairs: serious matters, even my father's funeral. I was bedridden for mere days, and yet weeks of correspondence passed between here and Greaves.'

‘So letters were written in your name? This is bad.' Peter shook his head. He rose and paced up and down the broken floor, clapping his arms against his sides. Suddenly he stopped. ‘Do you ever think that someone is contriving against you?' So remarkably did he resemble Michael that he could almost have been a doppelgänger made in my husband's image; perhaps that was why I found it impossible to unburden myself to him. I shook my head, but found myself whispering a contrary, ‘Yes. Yes, I do.' How many warnings did I need? Peg intimated daily that Michael contrived against me. Now his own brother echoed her concerns. I felt wholly desolate.

To my surprise Peter sprang towards me, crouching low so that his face was close to mine, and took both my hands in his. ‘Grace, I know you are stronger than we all at first believed. But you should not be alone here. And as for Michael; don't waste your sympathies on him. He does not deserve you.' His face had taken on a beseeching expression uncannily like Michael's.

‘Peter. Don't do this.'

But he held my fingers tighter and would not release them. ‘Leave now, with me,' he urged, not letting go, and pressing my fingertips with his. ‘There are things I know, Michael's secrets, that I have made a great oath not to divulge. I know why he brought you here. It is outrageous.'

I glanced at the statue. Naturally, Peter knew all about his brother's paternity.

‘I know all about it,' I told him. ‘Michael has told me. About himself, and his feelings of shame.'

‘Shame! So he should feel – infinite shame.' He began to caress my cold fingers, speaking fervently. ‘I would never treat you like that. Come with me tonight and he will never know. That's why I came here. I saw you in York, Grace – how you shone, like a jewel. The truth is, I think of you often. And not always as a brother should.' He raised my hands to his warm lips and began to kiss the knuckles.

A gratifying pulse of flattery lasted only an instant. Then a horrible apprehension flashed into my mind. Did Peter hope to outdo his brother at one stroke; by taking Whitelow from him, and by taking me? Had the brothers' rivalry escalated to this absurdity – that Peter now imagined himself attracted to me? Or was it – and this showed how deep my suspicions ran – a test devised by the brothers, to expose my treachery to my husband? I jerked my hand away.

‘Peter! This is nonsense. I suspect I only shine so bright because I am Michael's wife. I tell you plainly, I will not be treated as a plaything for the two of you to squabble over.'

My brother-in-law made a mocking feint backwards from my harsh words. Then, a moment later, he looked at me with some awkwardness. ‘It is not all about Michael, you know. I do like you exceedingly. But I see it now, it will not do.'

‘It will not.'

In a moment he was his usual affable self again. ‘Well, well. If I cannot tempt you to London tonight, might you not join our party in the New Year? You will be intrigued to learn who else makes up our party: Mr John Francis Rawdon.'

Now that did wound me, for I should dearly have liked to speak to my old friend.

‘He will be with his bride-to-be,' I replied smartly, ‘and she would certainly not welcome my company.'

‘Have you not heard? Your friend has broken with his bride. The rumour is that he paid a very large sum to keep the breach of promise from the courts. So he is free, sister dear.'

Horribly discomposed, I struggled to hide my feelings. For once, I found Peter's teasing quite as uncomfortable as did Michael.

I summoned a reserve of calm and said, ‘Peter, I will not make a secret assignation with Mr Rawdon simply to bait Michael. If you think I will, I fear you are entirely mistaken in my character. I wanted to join you in London, but all you have done is make me uneasy, now. It would be sensible to go now. For my own sake, please don't let Michael find you creeping about the estate uninvited.'

I sensed I had wounded him in turn, for Peter rose, put his hat on, and bowed with frigid politeness. ‘Very well, Grace. If that is what you wish. Write, if you change your mind. But, one day soon, you will wish you had come away with me.' He walked away, and I listened mournfully until his footsteps faded into the silence.

I sat a while longer and pondered his words, wondering if I had behaved like an idiot. I would have at least ended all this uncertainty if I had left at Peter's side. For some reason the motto on the tower's sundial entered my head, ‘The rod is iron, the motion is shadow'. Time is unstoppable, I thought. The spinning sun, the chasing shadow; both will never cease. But what of us mortals beneath the dial – are not all our days numbered?

On Christmas Eve I woke early to a sun-filled room. Michael and I had agreed a truce of sorts, based upon his wish to celebrate Christmas. Being raised a dissenter, I had never before observed the keeping of Yuletide. My father had delivered great rants against the popery and superstition of Christmas; there had been no celebrations permitted at Palatine House. Though at school I had sung carols and exchanged Christmas greetings, this would be my first true Christmas.

Peg and I had hung branches of evergreens and holly above the great entrance door, and all about the dining room and parlour. I searched out my gift to Michael: a diamond shirt-buckle I had bought in York. I looked for my husband, but he was already out, so I breakfasted alone; warmed by the bright winter's sunshine streaming in through the windows. On such a morning I could not sit inside. Without a word to anyone I took the gig to the village, enjoying the pearl-blue sky, streaked with luminous bands of clouds. I was rewarded at the postmaster's office by two letters, one from Anne and the second from Peter. Reluctant to hurry back to the Hall, I decided to be bold. The George had a wainscoted newspaper room where I fancied a lady might venture alone. Once inside, I found only a couple of old gentlemen puffing tobacco smoke behind their newspapers. With some pleasure, I found a bright window seat and opened my post.

Anne's letter was stamped from Santa Cruz, Tenerife, and was brighter and more cheerful than I could have hoped. Now accustomed to the rolling of the ship, she was feeling healthful and happy. She and Jacob had taken walks in the sun, and pressed many tropical flowers, some beautiful specimens of which she enclosed. The pumpkins and fresh meat on the island had improved her appetite, and she was content, though apprehensive of the next long period at sea. She wrote that the ship's next port would be Rio de Janeiro, and then, ‘to catch the fast trade winds to the southern hemisphere', they would sail back across the Atlantic to Cape Town. So Peg had been telling the truth when she described the erratic route she had taken. Naturally she had told the truth, I rebuked myself; she had taken the voyage as a convict. Nevertheless, it rattled me. If I were now to accept all she told me as true, I must never trust Michael again.

In this divided state I turned to Peter's letter. It was a friendly rebuke for my refusing his invitation, and a last attempt to persuade me to join him. I reached for my writing box key, kept always in my paint box, hidden beneath the block of Crimson Lake. As I called to the inn servant to fetch me fresh ink and a pot of tea, I found myself wiping my fingers. The key – did it carry a sticky film? When had I last touched it? Three days earlier I had used the key to inspect my depleting accounts, and immediately hid it again. I inspected the paint box closely and saw no other signs of disturbance. I even smelled the key, but the lingering pungency of linseed covered any unfamiliar substance.

The servant returned with my order and I forgot my moment of disquietude. ‘Yule cakes, missus,' she said. ‘It being Christmas Eve.' It was with a certain independent relish that I sipped my tea and ate those spiced delicacies for the first time. I wrote a hasty note to Peter, telling him that I had changed my mind and would indeed join him at the New Year, if he could assure me that his parents would be present. I had come to a decision: I would confide in the Croxons. I had to tell someone of my grave worries about Michael, the excessive strain on his mind, and my knowledge of his connection with our neighbour, Miss Claybourn. Privately, I also determined to consult Mr Tully about the terms of my marriage settlement, and whether Michael owed me a living if we separated. My trivial exercise of independence in coming to the George had settled it. I would keep Michael company at Christmas, as I had promised, but after that I would please myself. Satisfied, I wished Peter and his parents greetings for the season and laid my pen to rest.

Looking up from my writing, my attention was drawn to a prosperous-looking couple conversing nearby. They were both dressed in exceeding high fashion for Earlby but it was their warmth of manner towards each other that impressed me. As they shared a little quip, the gentleman set a swift kiss on his wife's cheek and she returned a private smile.

Once the gentleman had left, it was inevitable that the lady and I should notice each other. With a nod and a pleasant smile, she said, ‘How do you do? I am Mrs Barthwaite of Monkroyd.'

‘Mrs Croxon of Delafosse,' I said, standing to shake her hand. ‘I am delighted to meet you.'

At the sound of my name Mrs Barthwaite's round and gentle eyes fixed on me in fascination. ‘You are Michael's wife? How pleased I am to see you up and about at last. We are well met, indeed.'