Authors: Tim Vicary
Sir Edward Carson had been there. He had spoken to her kindly and given Tom a little Union flag with the Red Hand of Ulster in the middle. He still held it proudly in his hand now as he sat between Deborah and Sarah in the back of the Lancia on his way to school.
He was proud of his father, Deborah knew. That was the greatest gift Charles had been able to give the boy. He had died like a hero; Tom had seen that. Yesterday Sir Edward Carson had come to Glenfee and said to Deborah, in front of Tom: ‘If it had not been for the heroic actions of yourself and your husband, Mrs Cavendish, not only would I probably be dead, but, far more important than that, this province would have been plunged into the unnecessary chaos of civil war, which I still pray God we can avoid. Not only Ulster but the entire nation is in your debt.’
It appeared that the government in London agreed with him on that if nothing else, because the police had confirmed to Deborah that, because of her sister's part in the events at Glenfee, no attempt was to be made to secure her rearrest. Quite apart from certain embarassing disclosures in London, newspaper interest in the deaths at Glenfee had been intense, and the government would have been extremely foolish to imprison anyone who had played a part in foiling the German plot.
Of the two surviving Germans, one, Adolf, had escaped, and the other, the injured Franz, confirmed what Charles had told Deborah, that Simon Fletcher had been promised a fortune in German marks to betray UVF secrets and kidnap his commanding officer's son. Sometimes, in her prayers, Deborah had asked God why this thing had had to happen to Charles, instead of any one of dozens of other senior officers of similar background in the UVF. But the only one who knew the answer to that was Werner, and he was dead.
As they approached St Andrew's Preparatory School Deborah clutched her son's hand more tightly.
I can't do it,
she thought,
I can't let him go again
. But the headmaster, Dr Duncan, was there with his wife on the main steps to meet her, and Tom was clearly so embarrassed by his mother's concern that she had to let go. Dr Duncan himself was crippled with guilt and determined to make amends in any way he could.
‘Under no circumstances, madam,’ he repeated endlessly as they toured the building and settled Tom down again in his dormitory, round the door of which peered the wide, curious eyes of half a dozen of his friends. ‘Under no circumstances whatsoever will young Cavendish or any other boy from now on be allowed to leave the grounds of this school without being accompanied by a member of staff — and Tom will not be allowed home unless you personally come to fetch him. It was a most dreadful thing, dreadful, and I am determined it will never happen again.’
Of course it won't, you silly man, she thought wearily. My husband's dead, no one would want to kidnap Tom now. And, in a strange way his pompous, pointless assurances helped her to deal with her own anxiety. Life had to go on, Tom had to grow up, he couldn't stay tied to her skirts forever.
Nevertheless Tom allowed her to kiss him, and she saw tears well in his eyes, briefly, as she left. In the car, Deborah waved and waved until the car turned a bend in the rutted track and the old ivy-clad school was out of sight. Sarah touched her arm.
‘He'll be all right, Debbie,’ she said. ‘Truly.’
Deborah dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I know he will. Oh, that stupid man!’
‘Who? Dr Duncan?’ Sarah smiled. ‘I expect if any German comes he'll bite their legs like a bulldog.’
‘And make them write a thousand lines.’
‘Yes.’
The sisters smiled at each other. The chauffeur, Robinson, drove stolidly along the country track and out on to the road beside Lough Neagh. After a while they came to a small village where a stream joined the lake and Deborah leaned forward and touched Robinson on the shoulder.
‘Pull in at the grocer's shop, will you please? If I remember rightly, we can get a cup of tea there and stretch our legs in the garden.’
The grass was almost dry now, and the woman agreed to serve them tea outside at a small wooden table. While they were waiting, Deborah and Sarah wandered down to the shore. The sunlight sparkled on the waters of the lough, and little puffy white clouds floated high in the warm blue sky. A few hundred yards away, a heron stood motionless in a bank of reeds.
‘You are lucky, living here,’ Sarah said. ‘In London, one forgets.’
‘Yes.’ Deborah took a deep breath. ‘Sarah, there is something I have to tell you.’
‘So serious?’ Sarah turned to her, surprised. ‘Debbie? What is it?’
‘I . . . ‘ She hesitated. It is a secret that does not have to be told at all, Deborah realised. Not now. Charles is dead, and I am an honoured widow. Everyone will assume that the baby is his.
Unless . . .
Maybe I'll come over and see you some time. And we can meet . . .
Rankin's words had sounded so callous when he said them. Standing with his hands in his pockets under the street lamp, watching her walk away. She had hated him then. But now Deborah knew that some day, some time, she would have to see him again. Not for passion. That was all gone, a fever that had passed. But to let him know . . .
What?
That she was glad they had been lovers. That she did not hate him anymore. That he was right; his child would be brought up in a good home, with all the advantages which wealth and education could give. And that she would love it, with a love as fierce and protective as she had for Tom.
I would like to tell him that, Deborah thought. And that if I had not taken his advice, I would have lost Tom also. But if he does come, and Sarah is here? I shall have to pretend, and deceive her.
Still Deborah hesitated. She thought of Sarah, who had wanted children so much and would probably never have any now. She would probably stay married to Jonathan for form's sake, but they wouldn't live together, not any more. She was likely to be hurt, jealous even, when she learnt that Deborah was pregnant; if she learnt about Rankin too she might never speak to her sister again.
But Deborah was tired of lies. She realised how much she needed someone in her life to whom she could speak honestly. Who would love her for what she really was. Charles was dead, and anyway, she had never been able to talk to him. Even if Rankin came, he would go away again after an hour or a day or a week — she would never be able to rely on him.
So if not Sarah, who?
I could go and whisper my secret to a shell on the seashore, she thought. And what good would that do?
I don't want her to go back to London, and leave me alone with my guilt and my memories. I want her to stay here with me at Glenfee, at least for a while. When my baby is born I want someone to share the moment with me. I want there to be at least one person, apart from myself, who knows everything about where it came from and how it was conceived, and who still loves it, for all that.
I want that person to be Sarah, my sister.
I want her to know the truth.
So she began.
‘A while ago I met a man . . .’
The two rich ladies, Mrs Devlin thought, did not seem to know their own minds. They had ordered tea at eleven o'clock in the morning, but when she had laid a cloth over the wooden table in the garden and set out two willow pattern cups with the sugar bowl and the milk jug and the tea pot which was only a little chipped at the spout, and a selection of cakes with some hot soda bread fresh from the oven, they had not come to sit down.
They just continued pacing up and down by the shore of the lough, the fair-haired one in the blue coat doing all the talking, while the slim dark one in the grey skirt and jacket and straw hat listened quietly, until all the heat had gone out of the soda bread and the tea in the pot would be tepid and stewed for sure. At times they frowned and looked very solemn, and once the fair one cried, so that Mrs Devlin felt certain all the good food would go to waste, but the dark one put her arm around the fair one and started talking earnestly, and they walked right the way up to the reeds so that the heron flew away in disgust.
Mrs Devlin was just wondering whether to clear the table and brew fresh tea, or give it all to the chauffeur, when the two ladies suddenly came and sat down laughing and ate and drank as though it was the most delightful meal they had had in their lives.
Mrs Devlin didn't like to interfere. She just stood at the stone sink in her kitchen and watched from the window until they had finished, and marvelled. All that money, so that they could have a chauffeur in a big shiny six-seater car just sitting outside the shop by the roadside reading the newspaper until their ladyships were ready, and yet they understood nothing about good food and drink. Perhaps it came from living in a big house, Mrs Devlin thought, where everything would be stone cold anyway by the time it reached the table from the kitchens. Maybe rich folk grew to like their food and drink like that.
Anyway, the two ladies had certainly found plenty to talk about, Mrs Devlin couldn't deny that. They spent nearly two hours in her garden, and never let up for a moment. And when at last they came to pay and left her a two shilling tip, they were both smiling and laughing all the time, as though the good Lord had just granted an extra birthday to the pair of them.
Mrs Devlin came out into the garden to clear the table, and stood watching wistfully as they drove away out of sight, in the back of the shiny black car.
Tim Vicary is the author of over 25 books, including legal thrillers, historical novels and graded readers for foreign learners of English. He lives in the English countryside near the historic city of York, in the north east of England. You can find out more about Tim on his
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You might like to read another of Tim Vicary's historical novels. To see them online, just click on one of the links below.
The Blood Upon the Rose
The Monmouth Summer
Nobody's Slave
Tim Vicary has also written a series of Legal Thrillers, about a tough barrister called Sarah Newby. The first three books in the series are:
A Game of Proof
A Fatal Verdict
Bold Counsel