Michael Cox (6 page)
Authors: The Glass of Time (mobi)
FROM THE TERRACE door, I passed under an arched gateway, then down a shallow flight of steps leading to an area of smooth, sunlit lawn, dotted about with croquet hoops. On the far side of the lawn, opened back against a crumbling fragment of ancient castellated wall, a door – iron-studded and time-blackened – seemed to beckon me.
In a few moments, I found myself in Paradise.
I was standing in an ancient quadrangle, such as one finds in a cathedral, or in one of the colleges at Oxford or Cambridge that Mr Thornhaugh had shown me pictures of. On three sides were dark, fan-vaulted cloisters; the fourth side, in which was set a large painted window, again of ancient date, formed the eastern end of the Chapel. In the centre of the court, a fountain played, sending out delicate, tinkling echoes.
On the petal-strewn flagstones of the central area were a great number of urns and troughs, some fashioned of lead, others of weathered stone, from which tumbled a profusion of late-summer geraniums, ferns, and trailing periwinkles. In between were several low, fluted columns, some bearing sculptured busts of blank-eyed Roman emperors (I immediately recognized Lucius Septimius Severus, whose name used to delight me as a child). Others, wreathed round with glistening green ivy, stood empty and broken.
Threading my way to the far side of the court, I sat down on a little iron bench, and leaned my head against the warm stone of the Chapel wall.
The sound of splashing water mingled deliciously with the gentle cooing of a pair of white doves that had just that moment fluttered down to land on a fantastical dovecote made to represent the great house itself. As I was drinking in the scene, I began to think of Madame, and of what she might be doing at this hour; and then of Mr Thornhaugh, pupil-less now. How he would relish Evenwood, and especially this little portion of Paradise!
It had been Mr Thornhaugh who had first read the legends of King Arthur to me, and shown me such scenes as this, painted in the most brilliant colours, in a Book of Hours from the Middle Ages that he possessed. Now here I sat, in my very body, in just such a place, like Camelot made real – substantial and vividly present to my senses, yet seeming somehow dreamlike, and beyond Time.
A dazzlingly painted, sun-faced clock over the entrance to the quadrangle was now chiming half past twelve, reminding me that it had been a long time since Barrington had brought me my breakfast tray. So up I jumped to go in search of the steward’s room, where I hoped some luncheon would be provided.
I HAD NOT gone far in my search when I discovered Sukie emptying her bucket down a drain.
She greeted me with a cheery smile and a shy little half-wave, before looking about nervously, as if to assure herself that no one had observed her committing such a disgracefully presumptuous act.
I asked whether she could show me the way to the steward’s room.
‘Certainly, miss,’ she said, setting down her bucket. Then, glancing over her shoulder once more, and lowering her voice to a giggling whisper, she added: ‘Miss Alice, I should say!’
She led me over to a door on the far side of the yard, and then down a series of well-worn steps until we came at last to a passage leading into the servants’ hall – cavernous, and lit by a row of round windows set high up in the wall opposite the huge fire-place and range that dominated the hall, and before which some half a dozen or so of the below-stairs population were seated round a large table taking their mid-day meal.
‘It’s the door over there, Miss Alice,’ whispered Sukie, pointing to an opaquely glazed screen at the far end.
I felt the curious gaze of the other servants on me as I made my way down the hall. One or two smiled a greeting, and one old gentleman with a grizzled beard rose as I passed to make me a stately bow.
At the open door of the steward’s room, I halted.
Three persons were sitting round a table, engaged in earnest discussion.
‘Nine o’clock this morning,’ one of them – a short, middle-aged man, with a few strands of thin ginger hair pomaded carefully across his otherwise bald head – was saying. This proved to be the butler, Mr Pocock.
‘Fifth stroke,’ he went on. ‘There’s something to put on your gravestone!’
‘You don’t say, Mr Pocock. Fifth stroke. Well, well.’
This satirical remark issued from a rather fleshy young man, sardonic of countenance, and dressed in livery.
‘No doubt about it,’ replied Mr Pocock, nodding his head definitively. ‘Dr Pordage was called, and his repeater, as you well know, Henry Creswick, is never wrong.’
The third man, somewhat elderly, with a weathered face and bushy grey side-whiskers, now delivered the opinion that this was all very well, but exhorted Mr Pocock to remember the rooks. The explanation of this cryptic remark soon followed.
‘The rooks know, Mr Pocock. They allus know. I saw ’em plain as day – five or six of the devils, as ’e were walkin’ up the Rise yesterday mornin’. They was a-swirlin’ and a-swoopin’ all about ’im like Death’s black servants. I said to Sam Waters, ’e’ll be dead by tomorrow night, and sure enough ’e was.’
Then I understood that they were speaking of the sudden death that morning of the Librarian, Professor Slake.
‘You mark my words,’ the elderly man went on, ‘they allus know. Never knowed ’em to be wrong. It were the same with my Lady’s father, that day in ’53. I saw ’im ride off to Stamford, with the grandsires of those same black devils that followed the Professor a-wheelin’ at his back. I said then, ’ed better look out – you won’t remember that, Robert Pocock. It were before your time. But I said it, and so it was.’
After refreshing himself from a large pewter tankard, the elderly man – Mr Maggs, the head gardener, as I subsequently learned – was on the point of making some further observations on the subject when a young woman entered the room carrying a bottle of wine and an empty glass on a tray.
III
The Housekeeper
SHE STOOD FOR a moment in the doorway, regarding me with a most curious smile, almost as if she knew me, although I had never seen her before. The others, observing that her attention had been caught by something, all turned their heads towards me.
‘I beg your pardon for disturbing you,’ I said, feeling quite uncomfortable at the four pairs of curious eyes studying me; but I was an actress now, as I had dreamed of being as a child, with an actress’s power to convince my audience that I was someone I was not. On, then, with the character of docile Miss Gorst, newly appointed lady’s-maid.
Mr Pocock rose to his feet with a welcoming smile.
‘Miss Gorst, I believe,’ he said. ‘Come in, come in – if I may speak on your behalf, Mrs Battersby?’
He looked enquiringly towards the young woman with the tray, who nodded at him, laid the tray down on a sideboard, and walked over to the head of the table. Making no attempt to greet me, or to introduce herself formally, she stood looking at me for a moment or two before taking her seat.
So this was the fearsome Mrs Battersby. From the little I had gleaned of her from Sukie, I had pictured some tyrannical old retainer, ill-tempered and parochial, a bigoted harridan immovably set in her ways; but the person I now saw was as far from my imaginings as it was possible to be.
She was no more than thirty or so years old, as I guessed, and, whilst not tall, her figure was slim and elegant. Light-brown hair, gathered under a pretty lace cap, framed a small, well-proportioned face, which, despite a slight chubbiness about the chin and neck, many would have considered to be quietly beautiful. I was particularly struck by her hands, with their long, tapering fingers, the nails showing every sign of regular care – not at all the rough country hands of the Mrs Battersby I had pictured.
Equally surprising was her manner. I had expected vulgar truculence and provincial narrowness. Instead, she had a cultivated guardedness about her – the self-confident look of an educated person possessed of an active and critical intelligence. This impression was made both unsettling and tantalizing by the singular cast of her mouth, which tilted upwards on one side, and downwards on the other, seemingly set in a permanent half-smile – at once cynical and inviting. It was as if she wore a divided mask – one half sweetly amiable, the other sour-faced and disapproving, both together producing a mystifying and confused effect in the observer as to the true state of her feelings. As I was to discover, there was nothing outright and unequivocal about Mrs Jane Battersby: everything was held in and considered, or insinuated in the most gradual and ambiguous manner.
‘I am glad to meet you, Miss Gorst,’ she said at last, smiling, or not smiling, I could not quite tell, ‘and happy that you have decided to join us here for your meals, as your predecessor was pleased to do. Will you take a little beef?’
Her voice was low and soft, with an unmistakable refinement of tone, the words delivered slowly and deliberately. She nodded to the young man, Henry Creswick, who, introducing himself as Mr Perseus Duport’s valet, drew out a chair for me, then handed me a plate, a glass, and cutlery, before helping me to some beef and potatoes.
The others sat silently observing me as I ate my meal and drank down my barley-water – Lady Tansor, as I was to learn, allowed wine or beer to be drunk by her servants only at supper-time, and then in strictly regulated quantities.
It seemed as if no one felt able to engage me in conversation until liberated by the example of Mrs Battersby, who remained resolutely silent. It was only when my plate was empty that she spoke, to ask how I liked Evenwood.
I replied that it was the most wonderful place I had ever seen.
‘Wonderful certainly,’ she said, her disconcerting smile having the effect of mitigating what was clearly her real sentiment, ‘for those who have nothing to do but live here and look at it; but a world of work, of course, for everyone else.’
Then she turned to Mr Pocock.
‘The roof has leaked again in the old nursery, and plaster has come down all over the linoleum. I had to send Sukie Prout up there this morning. I informed Lady Tansor a month since that Badger must be sent up to make the repairs, but nothing has been done, and Badger won’t go unless her Ladyship directs him to herself.’
‘Mr Baverstock says that the place is becoming sadly neglected,’ said Mr Pocock, shaking his head. ‘There’s money enough, but she’s let things go, and Mr Baverstock says that she won’t listen when she’s told what’s required. It wouldn’t have happened in old Lord Tansor’s time, and the late colonel, God bless him, would have taken things in hand, no doubt about that. I’d thought that Mr Perseus might see it, but he’s too busy with his verses.’
‘Ah,’ said Mr Maggs, ‘but then she don’t ’old sway like the old Lord. There was a man o’ power, if you like. Finger in every pie in the land. They’d all come to Evenwood in them days – even the Prime Minister – just to see what his Lordship thought o’ things. The Queen ’erself came once, with German Albert. But the great folk from London don’t come no more.’
He too shook his head ruefully.
‘No, she don’t ’old sway like the old Lord, nor never will.’
‘Enough, Timothy Maggs.’
Admonished and abashed, Mr Maggs sought refuge from Mrs Battersby’s softly commanding eye by leaning back in his chair and puffing three times on his long clay pipe.
‘And where were you before, Miss Gorst?’
It was Henry Creswick who now spoke.
‘I had a position as maid to Miss Helen Gainsborough.’
‘Miss Gainsborough?’
The question came from Mrs Battersby.
‘Of High Beeches?’
‘No,’ I replied, confidently drawing on the story that Madame had devised concerning my imaginary former employer. ‘Of Stanhope Terrace in London.’
The housekeeper thought for a moment.
‘Do you know, Miss Gorst,’ she said, her smile now broadening, ‘I don’t believe I know anyone of that name in Stanhope Terrace. I was briefly in a position close by, and thought I knew everyone in that area. Isn’t that curious?’
‘Miss Gainsborough was a recent resident,’ I replied airily, taking a diversionary sip of barley-water, ‘and also travels a great deal. I don’t care for travelling, and so looked for a new place.’
‘Ah,’ said Mrs Battersby. ‘That would explain it.’
I turned to Mr Pocock.
‘Excuse my asking,’ I said, ‘but when I came in, you were speaking of Professor Slake, I think.’
‘Well,’ replied the butler, with a kindly smile, ‘you’re a sharp one, for sure, miss. You know the news almost before we do.’
As I explained how I had been told of the Professor’s death by Mr Randolph Duport, Mrs Battersby’s face took on a most suspicious look.
Had I somehow spoken out of turn? It seemed that she considered it improper for the newly arrived maid to raise the subject of the Professor’s death.
‘You were told the news by Mr Randolph Duport?’ she enquired.
Her question was politely, and of course smilingly, put; yet it once again made me feel that I was being accused of some transgression. I had no fears that she had any deeper suspicions of me, despite her questions concerning Miss Gainsborough, being confident that I had played my part well, in my first public performance at Evenwood. So I smiled demurely back at her as I recounted my chance meeting with Mr Randolph outside the Library, on his way to tell his brother about the death of Professor Slake.
‘Ah,’ said Mr Maggs, wryly. ‘Mr Chalk an’ Mr Cheese!’
Henry Creswick let out an appreciative guffaw at this display of wit, for which he and Mr Maggs both received a stern look from Mr Pocock.
‘Now, now, Timothy Maggs,’ said the butler. ‘That’s enough from you.’
‘Well, it’s no more than the truth, Robert Pocock,’ countered Mr Maggs, ‘as anyone with eyes in their ’ead can see. Chalk an’ cheese they’ve allus bin since they were babbies, an’ chalk an’ cheese they’ll allus be.’
‘And what was your opinion of Mr Randolph Duport?’ asked Mrs Battersby, who had continued to fix me with an enquiring eye during the foregoing exchange. ‘Did you find him agreeable?’
‘Oh yes! A most agreeable gentleman,’ I replied, with unthinking eagerness.
‘And so he is,’ agreed Mr Pocock. ‘Ask anyone, and they’ll tell you which of the two brothers they prefer. It’ll be Mr Randolph over Mr Perseus every time.’
‘I suspect Miss Gorst is no different,’ observed Mrs Battersby, her enigmatic smile making it again impossible to tell whether or not her remark was intended to censure me, for presuming to express a liking for my employer’s younger son, although I could not help taking it as such.
Just then, further conversation was interrupted by the ringing of a bell.
Mr Pocock called out to someone in the adjacent hall, who shouted back: ‘Yellow Drawing-Room. Mr Perseus, I’d say. T’other one’s gone off.’
‘Is Barrington there?’
‘No,’ came the reply. ‘Only Peplow.’
‘Then send Peplow,’ said Mr Pocock.
The butler was about to sit back in his chair and take a draught of barley-water when Mrs Battersby rose to her feet, at which he also stood up, the glass of untasted barley-water in hand, followed by Henry Creswick and Mr Maggs.
‘Well, Miss Gorst,’ said the housekeeper, her smile now full and direct, ‘I’m very glad to have made your acquaintance, and hope you’ll soon feel part of our little family. You will, of course, tell Pocock, or myself, if there’s anything you require. Do you attend Lady Tansor?’
‘She will not need me until dinner-time.’
‘Then you must make the most of a fine day,’ came the smiling reply.
Without another word, she turned and went out of the doorway through which she had come.
I, too, made to leave, but then thought of something to ask Mr Maggs.
‘I could not help overhearing earlier,’ I said, ‘that you were speaking of Lady Tansor’s father. Did he also die of a seizure?’
‘Old Carteret! Seizure!’ exclaimed Mr Maggs. ‘No, not ’im. Murdered, miss, in cold blood, for ’is money, just as ’e was ridin’ into the Park.’
‘No, you’re wrong there, Maggs,’ Mr Pocock broke in. ‘Not for his money. As I’ve told you before, I’ve heard something about this, and believe it to be the case that he was carrying very little money on him, only a bag of documents.’
‘But them what attacked ’im
thought
’e ’ad money,’ objected sceptical Mr Maggs. ‘That’s the thing, though the rooks didn’t care, one way or t’other. It’s all the same to them ’ow such poor mortal men as Paul Carteret go to their graves. They jus’ know they’re a-goin’, and that’s all there is about it.’
The conversation continued in this vein for some time, with Mr Maggs speaking in unshakeable support of the prophetic capacities of rooks, and Mr Pocock seeking to bring a more rational tone to the proceedings.
I was about to take my leave once more when Mr Pocock offered to show me a flight of back stairs, which he said would take me straight up to my room.
‘Of course her Ladyship’s maid is free to take the main staircase,’ he said. ‘But the back stairs are quicker.’
We left through the doorway taken by Mrs Battersby and passed into a narrow, white-washed corridor lined with prints and old maps of the county, coming out at last at the foot of a wooden staircase.
‘Here we are, miss,’ said Mr Pocock. ‘You can’t go wrong from here. Just count the floors. You’ll come out near your room.’
As I watched him return to the servants’ hall, another thought jumped into my head.
‘Oh, Mr Pocock!’
He stopped and looked back.
‘Can you tell me something? There’s a painting, in my Lady’s sitting-room, of a little Cavalier boy. Who is he?’
‘Ah,’ he said, walking back towards me. ‘The 19th Baron Tansor as a child. Anthony Charles Duport, painted by Sir Godfrey Kneller. Born 1682 – I remember that particularly because it was exactly a century before my father.’
‘Thank you, Mr Pocock.’
‘Don’t mention it, miss. Always happy to oblige.’
‘In that case,’ I returned, ‘was there ever – or is there still – a Mr Battersby?’
‘No, no,’ replied the butler, shaking his head. ‘Battersby is her own name. It’s always been the custom here to call housekeepers Mrs This or Mrs That, whether they’re married or not. Ah, I see you’re thinking that the name don’t suit her, with her good looks and all, and being so young. Well, miss, you’re not the first to think so.’
‘That’s true enough,’ I agreed. ‘The name certainly
doesn’t
suit her. But if there isn’t a Mr Battersby, then it’s rather surprising that there isn’t a Mr Somebody Else by now. I imagine that she wouldn’t want for admirers.’
‘That I couldn’t say, miss,’ said Mr Pocock, a little stiffly. ‘Keeps herself to herself does Mrs B.’
Then he drew a little closer to me.
‘All we know’, he said, in a more confiding tone, ‘is that she came here from a good family in Suffolk, and before that from a position in London. But she don’t have no ties, as far as anyone here knows.’
‘No family, then?’
‘None to speak of, miss. Father and mother dead, apparently. No brothers or sisters. Only a maiden aunt in London, occasionally visited.’
Just then, the distant sound of a bell from the servants’ hall caused Mr Pocock to break off the conversation, leaving me – intrigued by what he had just told me – to clatter up the wooden stairs, emerging at last, three floors up, on the landing near my room.
