A Dark Dividing (56 page)

‘It took a while to fit together the pieces I’ve actually got,’ said Harry, as they sat in the low-ceilinged room with the transparent Norfolk light flooding the house. ‘But in the end I managed it.’ He looked at Simone who was curled into a chair by the window. The light turned her hair to spun bronze. ‘One of the really curious things,’ he said, ‘is the links with those other twins—Viola and Sorrel Quinton.’

‘It was Sorrel who was Roz’s grandmother?’ This was Martin.

‘Yes. I think,’ said Harry, ‘that Roz saw a parallel between the two sets of twins—I think it attracted her to your family very strongly, although it wasn’t a healthy attraction. I think she resented that you had given birth to twins whose condition mirrored that of Viola and Sorrel and that you had done so in an age when there was a good chance that it could be dealt with.’ He looked at Mel. ‘But I’m on thin ice as to exactly what happened between you and Roz.’

‘To begin with I thought she was a friend,’ said Mel slowly. ‘I even felt sorry for her because she seemed so alone in the world, and she seemed so very attached to the twins—And then one day, quite out of the blue, she began talking about being owed a child.’ She glanced at Simone. ‘It sounds so melodramatic to say it now, but she wanted you or Sonia for herself.’

‘That’s mad,’ said Simone, and Harry saw her shiver and glance towards the door as if she was afraid someone might be standing outside, waiting for her.

Mel said, ‘She was seriously disturbed of course, but none of us realized that until it was too late. There had been a bit of an affair between her and Joe—my husband—and Roz had apparently become pregnant by him and then miscarried.’

Simone leaned forward at this. ‘Didn’t you find that dreadful?’ she said. ‘You never talk about my father, but you must have been devastated to find he’d been unfaithful with someone you thought was a friend.’

‘No, I wasn’t devastated,’ said Mel, meeting her eyes. ‘He was not a very easy man, your father.’

Harry thought she faltered, and at once Martin said, smoothly, ‘As for Roz, it’s not unknown for women to flip after a miscarriage, and try to steal other children.’

‘I knew that at the time,’ said Mel. ‘And was desperately sorry for her. I thought she was unbalanced, although I didn’t realize how mentally disturbed she really was. None of us did. So I made a plan to get you and Sonia away. Once we were out of England—once the operation had taken place and hopefully you had both survived it—Martin was going to try to get psychiatric help for Roz.’

‘So you decided to just disappear?’

‘Yes. I wanted to escape Roz, but I wanted to escape the press, as well.’ Mel looked at Harry. ‘They had been very intrusive.’

‘I can imagine.’

‘So,’ said Mel, ‘we smuggled the twins into Switzerland for the operation. A close friend of mine—Isobel Ingram—came with us, and afterwards she brought Sonia back and I brought Simone. We crossed to England on separate ferries—we reasoned that one woman travelling with a single baby wouldn’t attract any attention.’

‘Yes, I see that,’ said Simone.

‘The plan was that we’d let the dust settle for a few weeks—Sonia would stay with Isobel during that time—and eventually I’d vanish with both of you. Change my name and go to live somewhere else. We’d become an anonymous family—a widow with twin daughters. Completely unremarkable.’

‘But before any of that could happen,’ said Martin, ‘Isobel’s flat burned down with Isobel and Sonia inside—at least, a child we assumed to be Sonia.’

‘Only we couldn’t tell anyone we thought it was Sonia, because we had let it be believed that Sonia had died in Switzerland after the operation,’ said Mel. ‘I was absolutely distraught at losing Sonia—as I thought—but as well as that I was still desperately afraid of Roz.’

‘So you did everything possible to get beyond her reach,’ said Harry.

‘Yes. From a practical aspect it wasn’t too difficult. There were insurances from Joe’s death, and then I found out that Isobel had left me her flat and some money. So I sold the house and left London, and changed my name. And by then,’ she said, looking at Simone, ‘you were all I had. I didn’t dare draw attention to myself, and I didn’t dare draw attention to Martin, either. He had already sailed very close to the wind by condoning the conspiracy that Sonia died in Switzerland. So I ran away.’

‘It took me a very long time to find her,’ said Martin. ‘She moved from place to place like a grasshopper. But in the end, I did find her.’

Harry had the sudden impression that mentally and silently they smiled at one another.

Mel said, ‘I didn’t know that Roz had got Sonia all the time, of course. I keep thinking that if only I had known, Sonia might have turned out differently—she needn’t have died—’

‘Didn’t you check on Roz?’

‘Yes, because I thought I might need to warn Simone. But St Luke’s said she had left—that she had taken a job in the north to be near family, and I thought she had probably got over the miscarriage, and that she was making a fresh start somewhere. I thought the danger was over.’

‘But,’ said Harry, ‘the child who died in your friend’s flat—’

‘There was certainly a child’s body there,’ said Martin. ‘A baby of around the right age. But the body was badly charred—both bodies were badly charred—and conventional identification wasn’t possible. And this was more than twenty years ago remember, and there was no DNA testing then.’

‘I took it at face value,’ said Mel. ‘I accepted that Sonia was dead. Whether Roz engineered the fire at Isobel’s flat, I don’t know.’

‘But later on,’ said Harry, thoughtfully, ‘Sonia began talking to Simone, and years afterwards they met in that Welsh village.’

‘Yes.’

‘I still find that a bit spooky,’ said Simone.

‘It isn’t really,’ said Martin at once. ‘Telepathy isn’t so uncommon between twins.’

‘I meant the way she knew so much about Mortmain,’ said Simone. ‘But I see now that that was all from Viola’s memories.’

‘Viola had actually lived in Mortmain with Sorrel,’ said Harry. ‘She probably talked to Roz about it quite a lot. And Mortmain was a workhouse of the worst Victorian kind. For a child to live there would scar it deeply. I think Viola was scarred by those years—I think she passed a lot of the—the
darkness
of it all on to Roz.’

‘That’s your side of the jigsaw, isn’t it?’ said Simone. ‘Viola and Sorrel.’

‘Yes. Roz is dead, so a lot of it’s guesswork,’ said Harry. ‘But I worked backwards from Roz, and also—’ He paused, and then said, ‘I managed to talk my way into getting inside her house after the inquest.’

‘Friends in high places?’ Martin said it with a grin.

‘One or two favours called in,’ said Harry. ‘Probably vaguely illegal, but it meant I got a look at a lot of documents before they were taken away. Roz’s grandmother was Sorrel Quinton. I ransacked hospital archives for the first twenty years of the twentieth century, and although I didn’t find the record of their birth, I did find that the Quinton twins were surgically separated just after World War I ended—they were seventeen or eighteen. There was a brief record of it in the archives of Thomas’s Hospital.’

‘It would have been a barbaric procedure,’ said Martin. ‘Anaesthetics were still quite primitive then.’

‘But both the twins survived the operation,’ said Harry. ‘And later Sorrel married a man called Anthony Raffan. There was a marriage certificate in Roz’s desk in her bedroom, and there was a birth certificate for a son born in 1925. Charles Raffan. From there on it was quite easy to trace them all.’ He paused again, and then said, ‘I’m seeing Sorrel as relatively normal. I think she had quite an ordinary, happy marriage and life.’ Careful, said his mind. You’re letting the hard-bitten cynical act slip again. ‘But Viola never married,’ he said. ‘I don’t know if that was because she came out of the operation more—well, more damaged than Sorrel. I don’t necessarily mean physically. And then Sorrel’s son died in a car crash when Roz was four or five—there was the death certificate for him and his wife—and that was probably when Roz went to live with Viola.’

‘Why Viola?’ This was Martin. ‘Why not Sorrel, who was married and living an ordinary life?’

‘And who was also Roz’s grandmother,’ put in Mel.

‘Sorrel died in the late 1950s,’ said Harry. ‘I can’t remember the exact year, but there was a copy of a death certificate among the documents in Roz’s house. I should think Roz hadn’t even been born then.’

‘So that when Roz’s own parents died, Viola was the only one who could take her,’ said Martin. ‘Yes, I see.’

‘It’s so easy to imagine Viola pouring out all her anger and bitterness to Roz, isn’t it?’ said Harry. ‘All her memories of the years spent inside Mortmain.’

‘All the memories Roz passed on to Sonia,’ said Simone.

‘Oh yes.’

‘It’s no wonder Sonia hated Roz,’ said Simone thoughtfully. ‘And she
did
hate her, you know. She hated the—the weight of the sadness and the burden of sadness that Roz kept laying on her. Sorry, I’m interrupting the story. Go on about Sorrel and Viola.’

Harry said, ‘When they were in their early teens they were sold to, or stolen by a man who had one of those appalling freak-shows. They were toured around the country.’

Martin said slowly, ‘Straight from a workhouse into a freak-show. That’s something you might never recover from.’

‘I don’t think Viola ever did recover from it,’ said Harry.

Simone was leaning forward, her expression absorbed. ‘How do you know all this?’

‘Because,’ said Harry, ‘a man called Philip Fleury who lived at the same time knew about them. He knew a very great deal, and I’ve picked up a lot of clues from him. And this is where we hit the only real coincidence in all this. The Bloomsbury house that’s now Thorne’s Gallery was once owned by Fleury. I found him when I was tracing the house’s history.’ He glanced at Simone, and then said, ‘Fleury—Floy he used to be called—wrote a book about a little girl who lived in Mortmain House when it was a workhouse and an orphanage: a little girl who was there from the time she was a baby, and who was taken by a child-trader to a London brothel when she was twelve or so. At the end of his book Floy refers to Viola and Sorrel, and to their appearance in a touring show managed by a man called Matt Dancy. At first I thought it was just part of Floy’s story, but he had dedicated the book to Viola and Sorrel. So then I managed to dig up an ancient playbill from 1914, and sure enough Viola and Sorrel Quinton were once exhibits in a freak show owned by a man called Matt Dancy.’

‘I found a reference to those twins,’ said Mel. ‘To Sorrel and Viola. Before my twins were born I read up a few cases of other conjoined twins—d’you remember suggesting that, Martin? It was only a brief reference in one of the books, but it stuck with me.’

Harry reached into the battered briefcase at the side of his chair. ‘This is Floy’s book,’ he said. ‘It’s called
The Ivory Gate
, and it’s really the story of Viola and Sorrel’s childhood, I think. The dedication is to them, and also to someone Floy only called “C”. But it’s a truly remarkable story, and I think if it belongs to anyone, it should belong to you.’ He handed the book to Simone.

Final extracts from Charlotte Quinton’s
diaries 26th November 1914

We reached London midway through the afternoon; Floy had somehow managed to acquire a motor-car to bring us back, which was better and more private for the twins.

They sat quietly in the back, not saying very much, but watching the scenery slide past. Sorrel enjoyed it—I could see that, but Viola seemed wary and suspicious. Will have to remember what happened in that tavern room when she picked up the knife, and I think I will have to go very carefully with Viola.

Floy took us to his own house, and made tea for us all. (Am not sure how I shall cope seeing the twins eating and drinking, each using their free hand, passing things to one another, and clearly doing so without needing to think about it.)

The girls will stay with Floy in Bloomsbury for the moment; there is a big bedroom at the back of the house where they can sleep and be as private as they want. They will have to be brought into the ordinary world so gently and so gradually, and there will need to be discussions with doctors, to see if there is any way of alleviating their condition.

It was late by the time Floy finally put me in a cab, but we had talked, he and I, and we are agreed as to what must now happen. Floy has sent a note by special messenger requesting an interview with Edward later this evening.

Later
Edward sulky when I reached home. A fine thing when a man’s wife is not at home to greet him after a business absence, and why must I need go off to see my family at such a time?—could I not content myself with the running of my home like most women? He had provided a comfortable home for me, and he had rather thought I would like to stay inside it. I said, as quietly as I could, that I was sorry he had missed me, and he countered this after dinner by saying he supposed my gallivanting was to blame for the poor quality of tonight’s dinner.

(Dinner, in fact, was a soup made from leeks and potatoes from our own garden, followed by one of Mrs Tigg’s delicious steak and oyster pies—have not
dared
ask how she obtained the meat!—and castle pudding with blackberry sauce to finish. Edward drank the best part of a bottle of claret. What does this deceitful, conceited man
want
, for pity’s sake!)

Over coffee, he said, disgruntled, that as if all his other problems were not enough, now here was this man, Philip Fleury, calling without invitation, and what did he want, Edward would like to know. A mere acquaintance, that was all Fleury was.

I came upstairs, pleading a headache, and I am sitting in my bedroom waiting for the sounds of Floy’s arrival, and I am frankly frightened to death at the thought of what is going to happen.

Midnight

This is going to be appallingly difficult to write, but I shall try.

Floy arrived punctually, and was shown into Edward’s study. After a moment I went downstairs and joined them—Edward v. surprised—No need for you to be here, my dear; a little bit of business to discuss, just between men, run along now.

But I stayed, of course, and I listened as Floy related the facts of Viola and Sorrel’s birth, and how they had endured all those years in Mortmain and then been taken by Dancy for his freak show.

Edward was inclined to bluster and order Floy from the house—Can’t see what any of this has to do with you—but Floy simply waited until Edward had huffed and puffed himself into silence, and then said, ‘Quinton, it’s useless to adopt that attitude. I know what you did and I have proof of it. You sold your own daughters into the most appalling misery, and you let your wife and the rest of your family believe they were dead. You even arranged for a false funeral—and a revolting piece of over-sentimental theatre that was! How many people did you bribe to stage it, Quinton? Quite a large number, I imagine. You do know, I suppose, that quite apart from the rest, that fake funeral was a criminal offence?’

He glanced to where I was seated, and before Edward could respond, said, with a formal politeness that I had never heard him use before, ‘Forgive me for this,’ and then stepped back into the hall, and said to someone waiting there, ‘Come in, please. He’s in here.’

In the doorway stood two men, one dressed in plain dark clothes, the other wearing the uniform of a police constable.

In the same remote voice, Floy said, ‘That is the man I wish you to arrest. You will have your own language for the charges, but in broad terms they will be for deception, bribery, and the unlawful trafficking in minors.’

And so now they have taken Edward away to their cells, and tomorrow morning he will face a charge—several charges. The irony is that it seems unlikely that he can be made to answer for giving the twins into Matt Dancy’s care—as their legal guardian it is possible that the court will rule that he acted within his rights. (Nothing to prevent a parent selling a child into almost any kind of slavery, it seems—not so long since hundreds of poor mites were given to chimney-sweepers).

The policemen explained some of the formalities to me, but I had gone beyond understanding properly by that time. But I think Edward is going to have to answer to charges of various forms of deception and fraud: the pretence at that grisly funeral, the bribery of several people at the hospital where the twins were born, and a surprising number of church authorities.

I know I agreed to all this, and I know it was the right thing to do. But when I think of what is ahead—

When I think of Viola and Sorrel perhaps having to give evidence in a courtroom—

28th November 1914

It is over.

This morning Edward was brought before magistrates, and his solicitor (who was v. shocked and disbelieving) requested he be released on bail.

I sat in the public gallery—I wore the thick veil I had worn in Western Fferna, and do not think anyone recognized me. Edward looked small and oddly shrunken in the dock, as if someone had jabbed a thick pin into him and let out all the bombast and the selfish conceit. He was so pale his face looked grey.

The solicitor asked that he be released on the surety of £5,000, and appeared to think it was only a formality, and that of course Edward would be granted this bail. The magistrates—there were two of them and they looked very severe indeed—consulted for a moment in whispers. I leaned forward to hear what they were saying, but I could not.

Then one of them said, ‘We are reluctant to grant bail to your client, since we feel—’

That was when Edward seemed to stagger forward almost as if he had been pushed hard in the centre of his back. From being pale he was suddenly and shockingly flushed—his face turning dark purple, the veins on his forehead standing out like cords. He put up a hand, whether in supplication or defence it was impossible to tell, and then pitched forward over the front of the dock.

For a truly dreadful moment nothing happened, and then one of the ushers sprang forward, and somebody called out to get a glass of water for God’s sake, and a sort of muted panic broke out.

I had absolutely no idea what I should do, but before I could do anything at all, the usher who had come forward and who was bending over Edward straightened up, a look of shock on his face.

‘Is he all right?’ asked the elder of the magistrates. ‘Is it a swoon?’

The usher looked up at the high bench. ‘It’s not a swoon, sir,’ he said. ‘He’s dead.’

That was when I slipped out of the door at the back, and somehow found my way home.

Clary, silly wench, has been in floods of tears all evening. Mrs Tigg has merely said, All will be well in the end, madam.

‘If I said I was sorry it would be false,’ said Floy to me. ‘I can’t be false with you, Charlotte. But we will observe the conventions, my dearest love.’

15th December 1914

I have observed the conventions very carefully, and so has Floy.

There has been a postmortem examination, of course, and the word apoplexy has been used on the death certificate. It is as good a word as any; I do not know if Edward died from fear of the disgrace and humiliation that lay ahead of him, or if he died from a sudden, shamed realization of what he had done. I shall try to believe the latter, but I am not sure.

The funeral was private, of course, and people have condoled with me, but with an eager curiosity that I find repellent. I do not really want condolence, and I wish I could feel grief or shock or compassion for Edward, but I cannot. I can only think that he was guilty of that monstrous deceit, and that he condemned Sorrel and Viola to a childhood lived in Mortmain. I shall try to make it up to them—they are still with Floy, but when he goes back to France I shall take them to live quietly in the country somewhere until this war is over, and until I can talk to doctors about an operation for them. It would be a difficult and dangerous thing and I do not know if it would even be possible, but I believe it must be attempted.