Abdication: A Novel (17 page)

The conversation began to feel a little dangerous. Evangeline, Joan and Philip were all looking down at the plate of
escalope de veau en crème
that the butler had just placed in front of them. Evangeline tried
to keep her mind on the talk rather than the food. Droplets of sweat had broken out beneath Julian’s hair. He had originally contemplated abandoning the black-tie dress code for dinner after a couple of his socialist-minded friends at Balliol told him that they sometimes flouted the long-established and constricting rule and came to formal dinners in an ordinary day suit. At the last minute Julian had conformed out of respect to Joan, more than anyone else. The centrally heated air was getting to him as he dabbed at his face with his napkin. He could no longer remain silent.

“Forgive me, sir, but I hope you will forgive me for mentioning your brother-in-law’s views on all this?”

“Of course. Please do remind me. Mr.?”

“Oh I am so sorry. Of course. I am Julian Richardson.”

“We share digs at Oxford, sir,” Rupert added.

“Ah yes, Oxford. What a wonderful place! Spent some of the happiest days of my life there. Of course, Mr. Richardson, please do go on.”

“Thank you, sir. Yes, well I was going to mention that the Earl of Harewood was highlighting the dangers of Germany’s wider territorial intentions as early as last summer. You have only to look at the far-reaching and catastrophic influence Hitler already commands. I mean, sir, it’s not just fascism per se, but how could one not be worried about the increasing anti-Semitism that is infecting huge parts of Europe? Look at Italy. And if I may say so, sir, look at England. Mosley may not yet have had the success he craves for his blacker than Blackshirts, but he is having a damn good stab at corrupting the gullible in this country!”

As Julian felt the wave of anger break over him he wondered if he had gone too far. But the upper classes, and royalty in particular, so it seemed, had an entrenched antipathy to telling the truth.

What on earth am I doing here among all these people?
he wondered silently to himself. He took a large gulp of wine and the butler was instantly at his elbow refilling the glass.

He was debating whether to continue, when, through the flickering candles, he saw Charlotte scoop up the wedge of lemon floating in her glass of water and begin to suck it very slowly and deliberately while not moving her eyes from his face. The age-old trick of forcing an involuntary response at the sight of a mouthful of lemon juice had its instantaneous effect on Julian. The inside of his cheeks began to pucker and he found himself unable to utter another word.

The king, a man whose informality and approachability had been a hallmark of his popularity as the Prince of Wales, stared across at Julian with a look that combined incomprehension with pity. Easing out an American Chesterfield from the small silver drum on the table in front of him, the king turned to his right. Julian could see his diamond cufflinks glinting at the edge of the dark sleeve of his dinner jacket.

Nostalgia and a vestige of pride had seemed to sweep over the king at his own earlier mention of his part in the Great War. When the king turned to Joan, asking what sort of a war she had been through, Evangeline saw her godmother flush.

“Not so good, I am afraid, sir,” Joan began.

The king inhaled long and deeply on his cigarette. “Oh?” he said encouragingly, his left eye half-closed but the right one in full focus as he waited for her to continue.

Philip stiffened in his white leather chair.

“You see, sir, my sister was a nurse, stationed up at the front and she saw sights that no human should ever see. She was the kindest woman on this earth.” Joan’s voice had dropped to a whisper and the guests were now leaning forward to try and catch her words. “She saw men who had lost their hands, arms, feet, legs, chins, noses.” Joan listed the missing parts as if she were reeling off a shopping list at the Harrods cheese counter.

The king extinguished his cigarette. Philip stood up but a look from the King prompted him to sit down again as Joan, finding some sudden volume, finished her litany at something of a shout.

“And penises, sir,” she announced definitively and audibly enough for all to hear. “Is there any man here who could describe what it feels like to be missing a penis? Anyone know any penis-free bodies? Anyone ever actually
seen
a penis blown off?”

With each taboo-laden repetition, the assembled company winced, until Joan appeared to run out of breath and, closing her eyes, lay back, her face as white as her chair. The butler, well trained in unforeseen situations, lifted the claret jug and embarked on another round. For several minutes the only sound in the pale blue dining room was the splash of wine filling the empty glasses. Even Wallis had lost her social savoir faire, and remained sitting in her chair, a look of horror on her face.

“Tell Miss Thomas to bring the car round immediately. Explain that Lady Joan and I are leaving at once,” Philip whispered into the butler’s ear as the crystal decanter reached him. With his wife lying half-slumped opposite him, he drained his full glass in one. Everyone began to move from the table. Evangeline saw Wallis jump to her feet and, taking the king’s arm, guide him into the passage, away from the shocked silence that had filled the space left by Joan’s outburst, and out through the heavy, bronze front door towards the waiting lift. The other guests were ushered discreetly into the drawing room by Ernest where they remained talking in whispers among themselves, the ladies helping themselves from a tray laid with tiny glasses of a substance resembling mouthwash, the men accepting Ernest’s offer of balloon-shaped glasses of brandy. None of them saw Joan’s bundled-up figure being helped out of Wallis’s flat, Philip holding one of her arms and May the other.

While Wallis was showing the king out into the night, into the care of his waiting detective, Evangeline appeared more distressed than anyone else. She looked around for Wallis’s dog to derive some physical reassurance from stroking its warm wiry body but could not see the animal anywhere. All at once she realised she and Julian had been left quite alone together in the dining room. It was too good to be true. Torn for just a moment between retaining her dignity for her godmother’s sake on the one hand, and her own romantic interests on the other, she chose the latter and with a delayed, though long-planned answering wink, whispered, “What a shame poor Joan chose that moment for her little outburst. I had heard there was to be a splendid Grand Marnier
bombe glacée
for dessert and now we will have to miss it.”

Realising her misjudgement instantly, Evangeline lifted her hand to her head, inadvertently dislodging her carefully positioned wig. Screaming inwardly at herself for her clumsiness, she stood helpless as, with a look of disgust on his handsome face, Julian quietly took the coat and hat being held out to him by the butler, and walked out of the front door without a backwards glance.

C
HAPTER
T
EN

O
ne early spring evening, just as dusk was beginning to fall, an unfamiliar car came slowly down the Cuckmere drive and parked in front of the house. A tall figure in a dark suit emerged from the backseat, was greeted by Lady Joan, and marched into the stone hall as if he was leading a platoon of soldiers behind him.

May was on her way to the study to catch up on the large pile of correspondence. She had been so busy recently with the chauffeuring side of her work and was worrying about the backlog of papers that were piling up on her desk. She stood to one side as the visitor followed Lady Joan through the hall. May noticed his snappy black moustache and his neatly slicked-back hair, and then the man turned his head and looked directly at her. For a second his eyes connected so deeply with her own that she felt an intense physical jolt before he looked away and was hurried upstairs by Lady Joan. Sir Philip followed the pair climbing the stone stairs two at a time and closed the door behind him while May went into the study, disturbed by the unexpected encounter.

Back in January at May’s interview, Sir Philip had made clear that her job depended on keeping certain things to herself and not sharing confidences with the other staff, either in London or at Cuckmere. In theory, the rule applied to all Sir Philip’s employees, but May was aware
of its flouting by the others on a daily basis. In the Cuckmere kitchen fierce differences of opinion were voiced about employers, weekend guests and other members of staff. “Pantry football” was how Lady Joan referred to the clatter of pans and raised voices that sometimes broke through the barrier of the baize door. It was clear that from the clandestine manner in which the dark-haired man had been brought into the house, Sir Philip and Lady Joan were going to some trouble to stop his presence being discussed downstairs.

A cold dinner for three had been left in the dining room, rendering redundant the need for any serving staff. The following morning May was standing in the hall, her hand absentmindedly stroking the glossy head of one of the golden Labradors when the door to the kitchen opened and Mrs. Cage emerged carrying a tray laid for breakfast with a tiny glass vase of miniature narcissi sitting on one corner of the white cloth. The housekeeper, dressed in her usual long black woollen costume, her hair tied back in her neat grey ponytail, was concentrating so hard on balancing the tray that she did not notice May watching her. The job of carrying breakfast upstairs to a guest was always reserved for one of the daily ladies and it was surprising to see Mrs. Cage taking on such a lowly duty. May might have thought no more of it if she had not looked at her watch half an hour later and realised she had forgotten to ask Mr. Hooch to fill the car with petrol in readiness for Sir Philip’s journey to London the next day. She nearly collided with Mrs. Cage who had just reached the bottom of the stairs and was breaking into a sort of run, a red flush filling her cheeks. But Mrs. Cage was in no mood to pause to chat and hurried out of sight through the door to the kitchen.

May went straight to the garage where she found Mr. Hooch smoking a Woodbine, an angry expression on his face.

“Don’t know what they’re doing inviting a man like that to this house,” he muttered when he saw May. “I know Sir Philip says Sir
Oswald Mosley is helping him with important constitutional matters, but I don’t care if he’s come about the bleeding Saviour himself, pardon my directness.”

May had never seen Mr. Hooch either so animated or so agitated.

“Who is Sir Oswald Mosley?” May asked.

“Who is Oswald Mosley?” spluttered Mr. Hooch. “Oswald Mosley is the man in charge of the British fascists, that’s who. And a Jew-hater to boot. If we left things up to him, we’d have Hitler himself over here running the country. And then where would we be? If it wasn’t for Sir Philip and his reputation, I would have been tempted to put some of my supply of rat poison in the tank when his driver came to the pump for a fill-up. I mean, I ask you, what did we all go through for four and a half bloody years, if now we’re entertaining one of
them
to tea as if he were my aunt Molly.”

May did not press Mr. Hooch any further. She stopped herself from making any remarks about the dangerous attractiveness of the recent house guest. Nor did she say anything about the housekeeper’s furtive behaviour. She trusted Sir Philip implicitly and was sure he would not invite someone with those sorts of views into the house unless he had a good reason. But she was puzzled by Mrs. Cage. What could she have been doing upstairs for so long alone with the head of the British fascists? Much as she liked Mrs. Cage (who had never asked May to use her first name) at times she could not fathom her. May was trying to put her finger on this troubling feeling as she left Mr. Hooch and went to her room in Mrs. Cage’s house to pick up a sweater before resuming the afternoon’s work.