The Shadow of the Lynx (45 page)

She was in the greenhouse where she was trying to grow orchids and Donna was sitting on the bench watching her at her work.

“Nora, what do you think?” I cried.

“Bella’s going to have kittens.”

She turned to look at me and laughed and she was how I liked her to be—amused and friendly.

“What a coincidence!” she said.

“You mean … both of us.”

Nora nodded.

“Poor Donna will be piqued when she knows.”

At the mention of her name Donna mewed appreciatively and rubbed herself against Nora’s arm.

“So she’s stolen a march on you, eh?” said Nora to the cat. And to me.

“What will you do with them?”

“Keep one and find a home for the others. I think they’d like one at the vicarage.”

So we went in and Mrs. Glee served coffee in that rather truculent way of hers which amused Nora and was meant to show how much better things were done at Mercer’s thaa at Whiteladies.

“I’m giving a dinner-party next week,” said Nora.

“You must come, Minta.”

“I’m sure we should love to.”

“It’s going to be a rather special occasion.” She didn’t say what and I didn’t probe. I was sure it was no use in any case. Nora was the sort of person who could not be coaxed into saying what she did not want to.

While we were drinking coffee we heard the sounds of a horse’s hoofs on the stable cobbles.

“It’s Franklyn,” said Nora, looking out of the window.

“He calls in frequently. We enjoy a game of chess together. I think he’s rather lonely since his parents died.”

Franklyn came in looking very distinguished, I thought. I wondered whether there would be an announcement of their engagement and this was what the party was going to be for. One couldn’t tell from either of them. But Franklyn’s frequent visits to Mercer’s seemed significant. After all, I knew him very well and I was sure he was in love with Nora.

I really looked forward to the dinner-party. It seemed to me that it would be such a pleasant rounding off if Nora married Franklyn and we all lived happily ever after.

But on the night of the dinner-party I had a shock. There was no mention of an engagement. Instead Nora told us that

this would be one of the last dinner-parties she would give because she had definitely decided to go back to Australia.

Bella was missing. We guessed of course that she had hidden herself away in order to have her kittens, but we had no idea where. Lucie said it was a habit cats had. I was rather worried because I thought she would need food, but, as Lucie said, we shouldn’t worry about her for she would know where to come when she wanted it.

She appeared after a day and night and it was clear that she had had her kittens.

“We’ll have to follow her,” said Lucie, ‘and find out where they are.

”

We did, and, to our amazement, Bella led us to the tower. Work had had to stop up there because some special wood was needed and it was hard to obtain. Stirling had said that there could be no makeshift so that part of the work had had to be postponed. The door leading to the tower must have been left open, so Bella had found her way up there.

She had gone right to the top where workmen had left a piece of sacking and on this were four of the loveliest little kittens I had ever seen. They were tawny like Bella and I was enchanted by the little blind things and touched by Bella’s devotion to them. She purred while I admired them but showed her disapproval when I touched them and she was very uneasy if anyone else approached.

“We’d better leave them up there,” said Lucie.

“She won’t like it if they’re moved. She might try to hide them. Cats have been known to do that.”

“I’ll look after them,” I said.

“I shall bring Bella’s food up here myself.”

I went over at once to tell Nora about the kittens and where they’d been found and she said she would be over in a day or so to see them.

I went up the spiral staircase every day and I often thought of that occasion when I had taken fright. The feeling of fear had completely vanished now. The fact that Bella had used the tower for her kittens had made it marvellously normal. I made a habit of going up every morning at about eleven o’clock with a jug of cream for Bella and her food. She expected me and would be delighted each morning when I would inspect the kittens to see how they had progressed.

I was going up one morning when Nora arrived.

“To see the kittens?” I asked.

“You too,” she told me. She had become more friendly since the day I had ridden over and told her about the kittens.

“I was just going to feed them,” I said.

“Come up with me.”

It really seemed as though I had a guardian angel, for I believe that might very well have been the end of me if Nora hadn’t come with me. I put the saucer on the stone ledge as I always did while I poured out the milk. It saved stooping. Nora was standing slightly behind me and as I put the saucer in its place and started to pour out the milk there was a sudden rumble. Nora had caught at my skirts and was clinging to them. The stone ledge on which I had placed the saucer seemed suddenly to crumble. I heard the crash of falling masonry. I didn’t know what had happened because Nora had pulled me backwards with such force that we both fell.

Nora was on her feet first, her face ashen.

“Mintal Are you all right?”

I wasn’t sure. I was too dazed. I could think of nothing but that sudden collapse and myself being hurled forward, Nora with me . down from the topmost point of Whiteladies as the nun had gone long ago.

“The fools!” cried Nora. They should have warned us. That balustrade was unsafe. ” Then she was kneeling beside me.

“Minta …?” I knew she was thinking of my baby. I could feel the movement of the child and I was filled with relief because it was still alive.

“I’ll get help quickly,” went on Nora.

“Stay there. Don’t move.”

I half raised myself when she had gone. Bella was licking her kittens, unaware of the near-tragedy which had just been enacted. I shivered and waited again for my child to let me know that it continued to live. I was afraid to get up lest I did some harm to it and it seemed a long time before Nora came back. Lude was with her, her face strained and anxious.

“Minta!” She was kneeling beside me.

“This is terrible. Those men should be shot.”

“How are we going to get her down the stairs?” asked Nora.

“We won’t,” said Lucie, ‘until Dr. Hunter’s seen her. “

“There’s something about this tower that I don’t like,” I said.

What? ” asked Lueie.

“Something … evil.”

“You’re talking like the servants,” said Lucie sharply. She hated what she called ‘silly fancies’. Practical as ever, she had brought a cushion and blankets and she and Nora stayed with me until Dr. Hunter came.

He made me stand up.

“No bones broken,” he said. He frowned at the balustrade.

“How could such a thing be allowed!” he demanded.

“They’ve been hammering away for weeks,” said Lucie.

“We ought to have thought something like this might have happened. When you think of an old place like this suddenly being knocked about … In any case the kittens shall be brought down. The cat may not like it but she’ll have to put up with it. I’m sending Evans up to bring them down and put them somewhere in the stables.”

“You can walk down to your room,” said Dr. Hunter to me.

“But I think a few days’ rest would be good … just so that we can make sure. Feet up, eh?”

“I’ll see that she does that,” said Lucie firmly.

So no harm was done but Lucie insisted that I rest. She needn’t have worried. I was determined to carry out the doctor’s orders, thinking of the safety of my child. But two nights later I had a dream. I was in the tower and suddenly the terror I had experienced there came upon me. I peered about me but could see nothing. Yet there was something there-some faceless thing which was trying to force me over the parapet.

I awoke with a start and for a few moments thought I was actually in the tower. Then I was aware of my warm and comfortable bed. I was alone in it. Stirling slept in another room now. He had said something about its being better for the baby.

I lay thinking and remembered that time when I had mounted the stairs to the tower and had thought that someone was following me and the fear that I had felt then was like that which I had experienced in the dream. Maud had been below. But suppose she had not been down below. I thought of myself clutching that stone balustrade, the evil presence coming close behind me . and no one below! This was an example of the nonsensical imaginings of a pregnant woman who so feels the need to protect her unborn child that she imagines

people are trying to kill her. Why? For what purpose’ I shook myself fully awake and laughed at myself. Thi first incident had been pure imagination; the second an accident which could have happened to anybody. There wa no reason why anyone should want to harm me.

But soon I was to discover that there could be a reason Stirling wanted to give a dinner-party a rather elaboratf one. He reckoned that we were no longer a house of mourning;

we had been unable to entertain as he had wished at Christmas and he wanted to do something now.

I know that he was upset by Nora’s intention to leave u;

and I particularly wanted to please him. He planned to us the minstrels’ gallery and as it was years since we had player;

up there I went up with two of the maids to make sure every thing was in order. Later I discovered that I had lost a stonf from a garnet and pearl brooch which had been my mother’! and it occurred to me that I might have lost it in the gallery I went along to search and that was how I came to be then and overheard the scene between Nora and Stirling. Then were red velvet ruchings over the lower woodwork of th gallery and heavy curtains of the same material which could be drawn back when the musicians were playing. I was 01 my hands and knees looking for the stone, completely hiddei from anyone in the hall below by the red velvet ruchings, where someone came into the hall and I was about to stand ui when I heard Stirling say in a voice which I had never heart him use before: “Nora!”

Nora said: “I came to see Minta. I stood up but they didn’t see me and before I could cal to them Stirling said: ” I’ve got to talk to you, Nora. I can’t go on like this. “

She answered angrily: “Shouldn’t you have thought of that before you married Whiteladies?”

I should have called to them but I knew that only if the) were unaware of me could I discover something of what could well be of the utmost importance to me. On impuls< I shamelessly played the eavesdropper. I knelt to conceal myselj from them.

“Oh God,” he said, and I hardly recognized his voice, sc different was it from the way in which he ever spoke to me ‘if only I could go back.

”

She taunted him.

“And then? You would listen to me? You would have seen the folly of marrying for the sake of settling old scores?”

I put my hand over my heart. It was making such a noise. I was going to learn something terrifying unless I stood up at once and announced the fact that I was here. I couldn’t. I had to know.

“Nora,” he said.

“Oh Nora, I can’t go on like this. And you’re threatening to go away. How could youl It would be heartless.”

“Heartless!” She laughed cruelly.

“Heartless … as you were when you married. How did you think
felt about that?”p>

“You knew it had to be.”

“Had to be!” There was great scorn in her voice.

“You talk as though you were under some compulsion.”

“You know why …”

“Lynx is dead,” she said.

“That died with him. I shall go back to Australia. It’s the only way. You chose this marriage. Now you have to meet your obligations.”

“Nora, don’t go. I can’t bear it if you go.”

“And if I stay?”

“There’ll be a way. I swear I’ll find some way.”

“Don’t forget you have to see your children playing on the lawns of Whiteladies. How will you do that? You thought it was going to be so easy. All the golden millionaire had to do was make the family bankrupt.”

“That was done before.”

“And we suspect how. It’s nothing to be proud of. But it didn’t work out as you thought it would. Only the family could inherit this place so you had to marry into the family.” She laughed bitterly.

“All this for these stones, these walls. If they could laugh they’d be laughing at us. No. I’m going to Australia. I’ve written to Adelaide.

You’ve made your bed, as they say. Now you have to lie in it. “

“I love you, Nora. Are you going to deny that you love me?” She was silent and he cried out.

“You can’t deny it. You’ve always known it.

That night of the fire . “

“You let me marry Lynx,” she said.

“But that was … Lynx.”

“Oh yes,” she said, almost viciously, ‘your god. “

“Yours too, Nora.”

“If you had loved me …”

“You two were the most important things on earth. Of sol.-m 297

wuisc i lovea you men, ana u you had loved me enough . “

“I know,” she said impatiently.

“But it was Lynx then, and it’s Lynx now. We can’t escape from him. He’s dead but he lives on. You had a choice, though. When you found out you couldn’t buy this place you could have come back with me to Australia. Or we could have stayed here. It wouldn’t have mattered to me if …”

“If we were together,” he said triumphantly.

“But it’s too late. You’ve married. You’ll stay married.” Her voice was cruel again.

“You’ve got to see those children playing on the lawn. Remember?”

She spoke as though she hated him and I knew how deeply he had wounded her. I knew so much now. In the last few minutes everything had fallen into shape. Dominating all our lives was his father who had once lived here and who had been deeply wronged—a great, powerful man, whose influence lived on after he was dead.

“Too late,” she said.

“And you’ve no one to blame but yourself. When you told me … I wanted to die. I hated you, Stirling, because …”