Grace Hardie (36 page)

Bereavement was George's war wound, as debilitating as anything suffered by the men whom Andrew brought to live in his house and work his land; but he continued to administer the estate in the interests of the group, and this work had provided a speedier cure for him than for the others. The two elderly men together shouldered all the responsibilities for which the ex-servicemen did not yet feel ready – and that, today, included dealing with the
young woman who was sitting in the hall with her head buried in her hands as though she were on the verge of tears.

It was Andrew, tall and bearded, who emerged from the office. He smiled and held out both hands in welcome. Grace jumped to her feet.

‘I'm Philip's sister.'

‘Yes, of course; I remember you, Miss Hardie.'

‘I need him back at home. He has your company here, but I'm all alone.'

She paused, considering what she had just said. It was the truth, and yet not completely true. Any loneliness she might feel would only be temporary, for sooner or later her mother would return from China. And in fact she was not lonely in an ordinary sense. She would have been content with her own company had she not been confronted with the problem of maintaining Greystones. It was not simply companionship that she was hoping for, but support. Was that too much to expect?

She looked up at Andrew. ‘Will you let him go?' she asked.

Andrew looked at her gravely. ‘We've never held him. He's always been as free to leave as he is today. Tell him your problem and he'll make his own decision.'

‘Yes, but –' Why was she about to argue against her own interests? It must have been something in Andrew's calm, sympathetic character which made her wonder whether she was being selfish. ‘I don't want to say anything that will upset him. I mean, if he feels an obligation to come and yet knows that he isn't well enough, or ready –'

Andrew's eyes approved of her qualms before considering them. ‘He's well enough to be asked,' was the verdict. ‘And well enough to judge for himself whether he could cope with any demands you'd be making of him. I wouldn't like to guess what he'd decide. But this may be the right
moment for him to consider whether he should take up his own life again. I ought to add that in my opinion he will always want quietness. A lack of stress. Good air. A country life.'

‘He'd have all that at home.'

‘Then let's go and find him. I'll show you where he's working and leave you to talk.' But outside the house Andrew hesitated for a moment. ‘There's something I'd like to show you first of all,' he said.

He led the way round the side of the square house. The original garden area had been formally laid out in terraces and parterres; roses and herbs were still growing in the elaborate patterns which had been outlined by gravel paths two hundred years earlier. But Grace could see that within recent years the new residents had been allowed to make private gardens for themselves in the pleasure grounds. It was to one of these that Andrew now took her.

‘Philip designed this, and dug it out, and planted it,' he said.

‘Is he strong enough to dig?' She was surprised.

‘His muscles are strong. He can do anything that doesn't need sudden spurts of energy. He's learned how to take things steadily and regulate his breathing to keep pace with the effort. But I didn't bring you here to make that particular point.'

He waited silently as she studied Philip's garden and considered the implications of what she saw. The design was an extraordinary one. A wide stretch of grass gradually narrowed as it led further and further into what appeared at first sight to be a maze of flower beds. But it was not a true maze, for there was only the one path which circled and doubled back on itself and spiralled inwards before ending at last in a circle of lawn. Around this had been planted young yew trees which would eventually grow into a high wall.

Grace might have found the place disturbing, but instead felt comforted, even relieved.

‘After Philip was gassed,' she said, ‘I made a sort of – of object. It was exactly this kind of shape – although quite different, of course, going upwards instead of on the ground.'

She paused, checking what seemed to be an incoherent rambling. ‘What I mean is that when I saw Philip in hospital for the first time I knew what he was feeling. I could understand the hurt that had been done to his mind as well as his body. I still understand that. If he comes home with me, I shan't badger him with questions. I shall tell him my worries, because that's what I need, someone to talk to; but I shan't expect him to solve them. He can make a garden for himself at Greystones as well. I know that his wound is deep inside. I'll never ask more of him than he's able to give.'

‘Good. Tell him that. And tell him, as well, that he can come back here whenever he likes, for as long as he likes. Let's go this way.'

They retraced their steps to the edge of the grassy spiral and then moved towards a walled garden even larger than the one at Greystones.

‘Philip has invented a new fruit,' Andrew told her as they walked. ‘A cross between a blackberry and a raspberry, with no thorns. Last year there was only the first trial crop, but this year he picked enough to experiment in making jam and wine. He's just planting out cuttings to increase the stock. He seems to have an instinct for what can and can't be done in the garden. Here he is. Come back to the house afterwards and tell me what has been decided.' He left her to go through the arched entrance of the walled garden alone.

Philip was on his knees, using his fingers to press the cuttings into the ground and tuck the earth around them.
He looked up as she approached. There was a peacefulness about his smile of welcome which dispelled Grace's misgivings. At some point in the past two years he had come to terms with himself. ‘Can I help with anything?' she asked.

Without speaking, Philip produced a small garden trowel from the pocket of his habit and indicated a line parallel to his own where more cuttings should be planted. Grace set to work; and as she worked, she talked. Without asking any questions, without pausing for any comment, she told him all she had recently learned, starting with the parlous state of The House of Hardie and David's plans to mortgage Greystones.

Philip showed surprise when she spoke of Felix, straightening himself to look questioningly at his sister. She told him about her visit but was not ready – perhaps she would never be ready – to confess her own responsibility in the matter.

‘I've been worried about it all,' she said at last. ‘Wondering whether I'm being selfish – whether I owe a duty to the business, and what the right thing to do is. But now I've stopped worrying, because I've made up my mind. I'm going to make Greystones earn its keep, so that I needn't ever ask David for money. And if he won't take over the bills for Felix, then I shall earn enough for that as well. Even if I have to go out to work. I'm an experienced shop assistant after all! But I think the land will provide enough.'

Giving a slight nod, Philip began to tread down the earth beside his row of cuttings. With everything said that she had come to say, Grace watched without speaking for a few moments.

‘I need company,' she admitted at last. ‘Someone to talk to. Someone to stop me becoming the sort of old maid who chatters to canaries. Besides, Mother's going to get a terrible shock when she comes home and finds the servants
gone and no money for quite ordinary things. I'd like to feel that I have your support.' She laughed. ‘There's a vacancy for an unpaid market gardener, too. Will you come home, Philip? To do whatever you like, but just to be there. Please.'

So long was the silence that she could hardly endure it. But the request was not a trivial one; she had known that he would have to consider it very carefully. When at last he looked up, the sound of his voice, which she had not heard since he was wounded, amazed her by being unchanged, except for the effort needed to control his breathing.

‘Three days,' he said. ‘Will you allow me three days?'

‘Oh, Philip!' She had been so determined to pursue her choice of life alone if necessary that only now did she recognize how devastating a refusal on her brother's part would have been. She flung herself into his arms, half crying – but almost at once began to laugh, so incongruous did it seem to embrace a man who looked like a monk.

Philip's eyes were laughing as well, although he said nothing more. It came as a second relief to understand that she could help him almost as much as he would help her. He had always been her favourite brother: the quietest and kindest of the boys. They would live separately and yet together in the house which each of them loved. Everything would be all right.

On the morning of her thirtieth birthday, in June 1927, Grace Hardie rose early. Splashing her face with cold water, she pulled on a pair of khaki socks which had once belonged to one of her brothers, and then dressed quickly in the dark blue workman's overalls which could be called her gardening clothes or her working clothes or simply her everyday clothes. Although it was a Sunday, there would be no time for morning service today.

In a few hours there was to be a family luncheon party. Jay, still unmarried, would make the journey from London alone, but David would be bringing his wife and children. Midge and Will had only a short distance to travel from their house in North Oxford. Before they all arrived at noon Grace would dress herself as befitted a hostess, but the day must start with its ordinary working routine. There was no need to be tidy yet.

Her tower bedroom contained no mirror. As she ran a comb through her hair, she walked from window to window looking out; inspecting her domain.

‘Lovely day.'

She made the comment aloud without being aware of it. Had she realized how often she talked to herself, it would not have worried her. Other people did the same, surely. For different reasons the three inhabitants of Greystones – Grace and her mother and brother – rarely indulged in social conversation. Grace used her own voice to break the silence and thought nothing of it.

Carrying her flat house shoes in her hand, she went to the garden room which had once been the schoolroom.
Her Wellingtons perched upside down on the handles of the croquet mallets which stood, chipped and peeling, in their rack. Until a few months earlier she had always left the boots where they fell after she kicked them off. But one morning, as she worked her feet into the tight, clammy rubber, her heel shot down with such force that it squashed dead a nesting mouse.

Disposal of the corpse had brought on one of the asthmatic attacks from which nowadays she suffered only rarely. She remembered them as recurring events in her childhood, when no one realized what they were, assuming her simply to be ‘chesty'. Only gradually had various conditions been recognized as triggering her attacks: the pollen of particular trees, certain kinds of fog, cats, horses, anxiety, anger. Adding mice and murder to this list, she now took care to hang the boots mouth downwards.

Her first tasks of the day were the usual ones of feeding the hens and pigs. Philip, who always rose at five, would already have milked the goats. Returning to the garden room, she picked up a trug and a pair of secateurs, laughing aloud at the picture she must present.

Cutting flowers was one of the few household tasks which a lady might perform for herself without loss of dignity. She remembered being told that twenty years earlier by her mother, who even after the birth of so many children was still slender then; golden-haired, tall and graceful as she snipped at roses.

No one would ever take Grace, in her boots and overalls, to be the lady of the house. The short layered style into which Philip trimmed her black hair was, as it happened, currently in vogue, and so was her slim, straight figure; but Grace neither knew nor cared what was ‘in' or ‘out' in the world of fashion. Nevertheless, she retained a sense of the ridiculous. A costume which was acceptable, even
sensible, for her working hours was inappropriate for the gathering of roses.

She stepped into the garden and looked up at the clear midsummer sky. The heatwave of the past few days seemed set to continue; but that did not persuade her to change her plans and set out a picnic instead of a formal luncheon.

During the past few days she had cleaned and polished the dining room and drawing room until the mahogany shone like glass and carpets and cushions gave off a delicate perfume of rose water. It was no business of David's if the three permanent occupants of Greystones ate their meals as a rule at the scrubbed kitchen table and retired in the evenings each to a separate room. More than six years had passed since he had last been invited to visit his old home. She did not intend to give him the satisfaction of discovering the shambles which perhaps he expected.

David had never forgiven his sister for her refusal to offer Greystones as a sacrifice to The House of Hardie. Grace for her part had been slow to abandon a suspicion that without her opposition he would not merely have mortgaged it but allowed it to be sold. She had been angry, too, at what she saw as his spitefulness in cutting off funds from their mother as well as herself.

But the passing of time and a successful survival had mellowed her attitude. Since her mother appeared to feel no bitterness, why should she? What
did
upset Lucy Hardie was the coldness between two of her children. So today's family reunion represented a gesture of reconciliation – but Grace was determined that it should be seen to come from strength. That was why the table was already set with silver and crystal which shone and sparkled as if there were still a staff of eight to wash and polish. Only the great rose bowl and the six posy horns were waiting to be filled.

Breathing deeply to fill her lungs in the clear air, she set off across the terrace, over the lawn and into the serpentine
garden, striding to its further boundary for the sake of the exercise. She would pick the flowers on the more meandering course of her return to the house.