A Dark and Distant Shore (38 page)

‘It is. However...’

Lucy couldn’t remember ever having sat through such a – such a
sticky
conversation, but she was determined to go on sitting through it to the very end. Obscurely, she felt it was her duty to protect Vilia.

‘It seems,’ Perry Randall was saying, ‘that you have been not unfortunate in your inheritance. I hope the boys are well?’

Vilia had been turning to place her cup on the tray, and the spoon slipped. ‘Thank you, yes,’ she said, as she retrieved it from the floor.

Lucy was suddenly aware that his gaze had transferred to her, and said hastily, ‘Oh, we are all very well, too. Magnus and I live at Kinveil now with my father-in-law...’

‘Is he in health?’

Magnus or Mungo, Lucy wondered, but only for a moment. ‘Oh, quite remarkable. He’s eighty-two now, you know, but he shows not the slightest sign of failing, even if he tires more readily than he used to.’ The curious thing was that Lucy and her father-in-law, despite what Lucy always thought of as their early ‘misunderstandings’, got on like a house on fire. He wasn’t a gentleman in her sense of the word – in fact there were times when he could be just a little uncouth – and he was opinionated, and not very considerate, and went out of his way to annoy Magnus. She would have been perfectly justified in thinking of his age as a promise of release, but she didn’t. She would be genuinely upset when he went.

‘And what about – please don’t answer if it embarrasses you – my wife?’ His attention was focused wholly on her, as if Vilia weren’t even in the room.

She was possessed by an inane need to chatter. ‘Charlotte? Oh, well enough, in general, though she has some tedious infection at the moment and is confined to bed. But the children are so good with her, especially the girls, which is just what one would expect, of course, isn’t it? They all seem to be growing up very quickly. And Edward, of course, is nineteen, though you may find it difficult to believe.’ Vilia was looking at her a little oddly, but Lucy had the feeling she was too concerned with her own thoughts to see all the problems that loomed so hideously large and near in Lucy’s mind, fuzzy though it might be at this particular moment. Anything to prevent Perry Randall from finding out that the children were only a few miles away! He might insist on seeing them, and Magnus would never forgive her. And Charlotte! She could scarcely bear to contemplate what Charlotte would say, or how frequently she would say it. If the man had really cared about his daughters it might have been different, but he hadn’t sent word for seven years, and even now hadn’t left himself time to go to Glenbraddan. But of course, father-in-law had said he shouldn’t! How complicated it all was. And then, suddenly realizing that Mr Randall probably didn’t even know Shona existed, Lucy began to feel a strong desire to faint and have done with it. She couldn’t even fall back on Luke with any safety, because she would have to say he was in Edinburgh, and Mr Randall might suggest dropping in on him. And then he might run into Magnus! It was too much for her. She took refuge in a paroxysm of sneezing.

The next hour seemed interminable. Vilia said very little, and Lucy not much more. When pushed, she meandered on about the weather, and the fishing, and the forestry, about which she knew very little, and about the splendid raspberries that old Robbie Fraser grew in the walled garden on the mainland, about which she was better informed. Anything but the children. When she touched on them it was always
en bloc.
She went quite cold when Mr Randall asked specifically about Grace, but he didn’t pursue the subject and she was grateful. She decided he must still have some gentlemanly instincts left beneath his uncivilized exterior.

It was a wonderful relief when Perry Randall rose to his feet and said, ‘Mrs Lauriston, I have trespassed on your time too long. It was generous of you to receive me. Your servant, Mrs Telfer. I leave Edinburgh on Monday, so we will not meet again. Perhaps you will give my regards to your father-in-law, if you feel they would be kindly received.’

Vilia’s hand was on the bell. ‘Must you go?’ she asked politely, and gave it a decisive tug.

For the first time, laughter flashed into his eyes. ‘I must,’ he said. ‘Thank you again for seeing me.’ And then he was gone.

Lucy’s cold had almost disappeared by the time Magnus arrived to reclaim her on Monday, just before noon, bringing the Lauriston boys and Sorley McClure home with him. She had been grateful, in more ways than one, for her Sunday in bed. It had relieved her of the need to make conversation. Acutely uneasy in mind, she didn’t dare talk about Mr Randall, and yet knew that, if she didn’t, it would look odd. All she had said to Vilia, and that with some difficulty, had been, ‘I don’t know what you think, but I would prefer not to mention Mr Randall’s visit to anyone. There seems no purpose in reopening old wounds, especially as he appears to have no intention of coming back to this country permanently.’ And Vilia had said, with a remote smile, ‘I am sure you’re right.’

Magnus had to be shown the house and grounds, and persuaded, somewhat against his inclination, to partake of a morsel of luncheon before Vilia was at last able to wave them good-bye. Seeing Magnus after a gap of years, Vilia was absently surprised to discover how much less middle-aged he appeared. There was only a dozen years’ difference in their ages, but it had always felt more. Perhaps it was just that the high-nosed stateliness and bland self-satisfaction that had sat a little incongruously on a man of twenty-seven seemed more natural now that he was only two years away from his fortieth birthday. The years had given him distinction in place of self-consequence, and taken from him some of the fussiness. Though not all of it, for when Lucy displayed a tendency to linger he reminded her testily that they were going to the Caledonian Hunt ball that night and must have an hour or two’s rest beforehand.

When they had gone, Vilia set off for the foundry where she spent the afternoon making decisions, swiftly and concisely, that Moultrie or Richards could just as easily have made during her absence. She knew now that she was unlikely ever to bring them to the pitch of accepting responsibility, or to break them of the belief that there was something mysteriously and impenetrably feminine about her own perfectly logical cast of thought. Sometimes it irritated her, but today she could not care.

By the time she arrived home she was unbearably tired, and would have gone straight to bed after her usual hour with the boys except that it would have set the servants wondering. Even the effort of preparing for bed seemed beyond her, in any case, and it was easier just to go on sitting and to ask Mrs McKirdy to bring her something on a tray. She didn’t want it, but Mrs McKirdy was determined. ‘A vol-au-vent and salad, then,’ Vilia said. ‘Nothing more.’ Mrs McKirdy sighed and went to roll out some of the pastry she mixed fresh every morning and kept in the larder. It was beautiful pastry, for she had the Lowland housewife’s light hand with it, but she worried about her mistress eating so little.

Just before nine, Vilia heard a horse coming up the drive and its rider dismounting at the front door. She frowned a little when the knocker clanked. A neighbour? If so, it couldn’t be anyone important, for the local notables had all gone to the Caledonian Hunt ball.

After a moment, there was a tap on the drawing-room door and Sorley entered. His narrow eyes were almost apprehensive, and he hesitated, uncharacteristically, before he spoke. ‘It iss Mr Randall,’ he said, his voice rising as if he couldn’t believe it himself. ‘He says, will you see him if it iss not too late?’

Sorley didn’t know, of course, that Perry Randall had been here on Saturday, but Vilia was too paralysed to remember that. She stared at him, her face as white as the shasta daisies in the vase behind her, and said, ‘I... I... Yes. Ask him to come up, Sorley, please.’

Perry Randall took no more than two steps inside the room while he waited for Sorley to close the door, then he moved back and leaned against it.

‘I couldn’t just go,’ he said, his voice low and uneven. ‘Not like that.’

No social courtesies. No polite bows. No artificial apologies. No inquiries after other people’s health and welfare. This time it was just the two of them. This time it was real.

‘No,’ she said expressionlessly. She didn’t move from her chair by the fire. As so often in August, the evening was damp and chill, and the fire gave an illusion of warmth and normality. But her blood ran like ice water in her veins.

He couldn’t tell what she was thinking or feeling as he stood there gazing at her, all passion and longing ruthlessly excluded from his face in case it should give him away. He had no idea whether her hostility on Saturday had been genuine, or whether it had been a performance for Lucy Telfer’s benefit. Seven years ago he would have known, but now he didn’t. He only knew that as a performance it had been convincing, and he was afraid.

Her eyes were wide and clear under their long lids, the eyes that had haunted him, waking and sleeping, for seven years. She was more beautiful than he had remembered. Trapped in his memory had been something frail and evanescent, an incorporeal vision of silver-gold hair and pale skin and water-green eyes; and a character that was at once strong and yet desperately vulnerable. The reality was richer and more positive. Her skin looked warmer than it had been, her hair more golden, and her eyes darker and more lustrous. He didn’t know whether to set the differences down to a fault of memory or the passage of time. Her face was framed by the white ruffle of the shirt she wore under a gown cut as severely as a riding habit, a gown of the same subtle grey-green as she had worn on that fateful day at Ascot. There was a flush of colour on her cheekbones, and she was looking at him as if he were not welcome.

When the silence had reached its uttermost limit he moved forward and sat down, unbidden, on the chair facing her, his legs crossed and hands loosely clasped on his knee. If she had been on her feet he would have settled everything – he would have
hoped
to settle everything – by taking her forcibly into his arms, but her chair was as effective as a barricade. And perhaps it wouldn’t have solved anything very much, anyway.

He would have given all he possessed to feel her body against his, but when he spoke, all that he said, in level tones, was, ‘How are you?’

Her delicate brows rose. ‘Well enough, thank you.’

‘Happy?’

A faint smile flickered across her face. ‘What a sweeping question! I have the boys, the foundry, an occasional evening’s relaxation, a visit to Kinveil now and then. My life is satisfying enough.’

‘That wasn’t what I asked.’

‘I know it wasn’t.’

It seemed she had no intention of making it easy for him. There was a kind of fatality in the air, as if everything had already gone wrong and could never be put right.

He closed his mind to it, and, brushing the familiar, straying lock of dark hair back from his brow, said, ‘I owe you a great many apologies.’ It wasn’t how he would have chosen to begin. If she still loved him, the apologies weren’t important; if she didn’t, they were irrelevant.

She shook her head.

‘But I do, surely?’

She looked away from him and into the heart of the fire. ‘I have no patience with apologies. No apology can repair damage that – damage that should not have been done in the first place.’ Her voice was cool and empty.

He didn’t understand her at first, because it was so unexpected, but then he gave a laugh that might as easily have been a groan. ‘You mean that if one behaves decently and properly, no need for apology will ever arise? And if one behaves badly, no apology can rectify it? Well, that’s true enough, God knows! But it’s a Spartan creed, Vilia. It doesn’t leave much space for ordinary human weakness, and none for forgiveness, either.’

She frowned a little. ‘I suppose it doesn’t. But apologies and excuses have never seemed to me to be anything but a secular substitute for the confessional. Say you’re sorry, and your sins will be forgiven you. It’s too easy.’

‘There are penances.’

‘And what help are penances, except to the sinner? They can’t bring the dead back to life. They can’t put together again the ruins of someone’s heart and soul.’ She sounded as clinical as if they were engaged on an academic debate.

The chill settled deeper into his bones. He didn’t know what he had expected, but it wasn’t this deeply rooted, emotionless resistance. It didn’t seem possible that someone as loving and vital as the girl of seven years ago should have changed so completely, but if it hadn’t been for the animation he had glimpsed on Saturday, before her face had closed down at the sight of him, he might have believed it. Her hostility then, and this evening’s flat and total detachment... What in God’s name had happened in these last seven years? What could have happened to bring about such a transformation? He had come to believe, during that single week in London, that he knew all he needed to know about her – how her mind worked, and the shape of her emotions. He could still read her, he thought, given the materials. He could still judge how she would react to things – if he knew what the ‘things’ were. But he didn’t know the history of these last years, and that made her a mystery to him.

It had been the devil’s own luck that Lucy Telfer, of all people, should have been here, plunging them into a maze of deceptions and unspoken lies that contaminated everything, even the truth. If Vilia had been alone, he would have pulled her into his arms and made love to her with all the passion that was in him, and her response would have told him all he needed to know. The very surprise would have ruled out everything but honesty. He wouldn’t have given her time to think of all that had gone wrong, but would have reminded her only of all that had been joyously, wondrously right between them. Perry didn’t subscribe to the idea that physical love was all-important, but he did believe that love was for the heart, and explanations for the mind, and that the heart could often accept what the mind alone would not. Because of that, he had hoped first to touch her heart. And then, he had thought – sure that a love such as theirs couldn’t die – and then would come the time for explanations, apologies, even the deepest self-abasement.