The Uninvited Guests (19 page)

Clovis crept to the study and listened to the muted burble within before continuing. Although he knew the passengers were all satisfied for the moment, he did not quite trust the apparent emptiness of the house and seemed to see them still, from the corner of his eye, as he walked.

Upstairs everything was lit and welcoming as before. He knocked on the door of his mother’s room, the biggest, in the centre of the house.

‘Who is it?’

The voice was fearful; he had startled her. He went in.

‘Just me,’ he said.

Charlotte had raised herself up on her elbow. The huge bay window was behind her, its silk curtains half drawn, swagged and tasselled, like the curtains for the boudoir scenes of
La Bohème
at Covent Garden, where Clovis, Emerald, Charlotte and Horace had once sat in the stalls one unforgettable evening, and been bathed and saturated by beauty.

‘Are you all right, Mother?’ he asked.

She had sunk back onto the bed and sighed, and the question came from his heart.

‘Sit here, boy,’ she said, and when he did she took his hand.

‘The guests are all fed – the accident people, I mean – and the rest of us are having a bite in the dining room. Won’t you come down?’ He was reminded of the many times he had tried to tempt her from her room in the terrible days that followed his father’s death. Clovis had been sixteen when Horace Torrington died; he had looked after his mother as well as he could, and managed very well indeed – until she took another husband. Now he held her hand. ‘Ma?’

She did not look at him. ‘Is he still here?’ she asked faintly.

‘Who?’

‘Traversham-Beechers.’ She said the name dully, in one flat tone. She apparently had no difficulty in remembering his name.

‘Where would he go, Mother? Don’t you like him? I know he can gas, but I think I do, tremendously.’

She did not answer him. Then, ‘What time is it?’ She sat up slowly, blinking and patting her hair.

‘Not sure. Somewhere near ten, I think. I say, are you warm enough?’

The fire in her grate was all but out. Clovis crossed the room and poked the embers, then took the scuttle and shook coal onto it, with a great deal of rattling and dust flying up.

‘Oh, hush! My head!’

‘Sorry,’ he said cheerfully and went to the window. ‘Dreadful night. It’ll be a bog out there tomorrow. Are you coming down or not?’

She surrendered to his clumsy affection, and held out both hands to him. Taking them, he raised her from the bed. She laid her cheek against the smooth lapel of his jacket; he had been tall enough for her to do it comfortably since about the time of his father’s funeral.

‘Darling boy,’ she said, ‘could you ever hate your old mother?’

Clovis patted her. ‘Silly question, Ma; what’s up?’

‘Answer. I need it. Whatever
happened
? Would you and Emerald hate me?’

Clovis dropped his guard and lowered his head in adoration, his clean cheek lightly touching her hair.

‘No, Mother, never. We’d never hate you; you’re our very dearest and you should know it.’

She was gay again; it was his reward. ‘Then come along, silly, and let’s go down. Why on earth would I stay up here when we’ve guests in the house?’

‘Parent delivered, as charged,’ said Clovis as he returned, and seconds later Charlotte appeared in the doorway, one arm artfully held aloft as she pushed the door wide.

‘Oh, my Lord!’ she cried, quizzical and aghast at the state of the room. The table was a study in chaos; a dream-world Caravaggio, a cornucopia of refuse. ‘What can have happened!’

‘Chimpanzees’ tea party,’ said Clovis.

The gentlemen hastily got to their feet.

Florence had stood up, too; her appetite had been bird-like. She barely tasted food these past years; it meant nothing to her.

‘Have you all lost your reason?’ Charlotte asked wonderingly, as her eye travelled over the mismatched, filthy table and those around it, all in disarray.

Emerald was not in the mood to be scolded. ‘Mother, if you’d been here, you’d know what a time we’ve had,’ she said censoriously. ‘Mrs Trieves has been wonderful, and so has Patience – everybody has. I suggest you get on with it. The rest of us are.’

All present stared directly at the floor, but Charlotte laughed as if her daughter had made the prettiest of speeches. She all but clapped her hands together.

‘You poor darlings!’ she trilled. ‘And your dreadful parent in her room. What must it have been like? How extraordinary things are tonight! Now, where shall I sit?’ And, like an excitable child, she took her place and gazed around her. ‘Which course are we on?’ she asked.

Florence was still uncertain, and did not meet her eye. ‘The second course, Mrs Swift – third if you count the soup we didn’t have – but I’m afraid there wasn’t very much of it. The passengers had appetites like dogs.’

‘So I see; between you you’ve quite cleared the place,’ said Charlotte happily. ‘Have our railway guests eaten all the puddings and desserts, too?’

Then they all spoke at once, describing their collective efforts, and the voracious appetites of their displaced houseguests.

‘They ate up all the pork—’

‘And masses of rabbit!’

‘We had to give some of them pewter—’

‘And they didn’t all have cutlery.’

‘Let alone napkins.’

‘Napkins!’

‘What fun,’ said Charlotte, ‘but are Robert and Stanley not back? What of the new arrivals?’

‘No sign of them, Ma, and no more people, either.’

‘What could have become of them?’

As they all talked, conjecturing as to the whereabouts of Robert and Stanley, predicting the abating of the storm, Traversham-Beechers alone said nothing. He sat, in his new place, at the head of the table facing Charlotte, and looked at her. For her part, she behaved for all the world as if she did not see him. ‘So, Mrs Trieves, what next?’

‘If more do come I don’t know what we shall do with them,’ Emerald said.

‘But there’s the cake, ma’am,’ said Florence, in quiet, grim tones; ‘they’re not having that.’ She rose to fetch it.

‘Oh, cake!’ squeaked Patience, and they all set about moving plates from here to there.

‘Oh, do call Smudge!’ said Emerald.

‘I’ll see to it.’ Florence nodded curtly, as she left them.

The diners had partially cleared the table. Myrtle had run to find plates for the cake and the gas was turned down to low, flickering flames, making the room into a warm cave. The candles still blazed in the candelabras, although meltingly now, smoking and dripping, pouring and spluttering, while the guests spoke in hushed, expectant murmurs as they awaited Florence’s return.

Charlotte found her eyes drawn to Traversham-Beechers, his intense scrutiny proving irresistible at last.

‘
Marguerite Gautier s’est levée de son lit
,’ he said quietly. Even though he was at the far end of the table she heard him, although she had the queer impression that others did not.

In the pantry, Florence took the green cake down from its high shelf. The tall, fluted stand lurched dangerously on its thin neck as she descended the step-ladder.

Myrtle appeared, breathless, in the doorway.

‘Fetch Miss Imogen, Myrtle, if she’s awake, or we’ll never hear the end of it.’

Myrtle darted up the scullery stairs, but returned seconds later with the mystifying news that Miss Imogen would take her cake ‘later’.

‘She’s locked that door again,’ she said darkly.

‘Who can blame her with the comings and goings tonight? Now here, help me,’ said Florence.

The candles were tall, fast-burning tapers. She had piped
Emerald
on it, and the grains of sugar in the writing and the green roses shone like diamond dust.

‘Don’t light the ones nearest you or you’ll never reach the back,’ whispered Florence.

Standing over the cake, like conspirators, they had to work quickly. The candles blazed beautifully, but very fast.

‘Now, get back,’ ordered Florence, as the last one was lit, and she took up the cake.

Myrtle darted ahead to the dining room and Florence went after, the flames flowing backwards in the draught of movement like comets, wildly.

Myrtle threw open the door and they were met with a gratifying gasp, and a small burst of applause.

‘Bravo!’ cried Charlotte.

Ernest, alone, was not looking at the cake as it made its floating entrance, but down the length of the darkened table to Emerald, to catch her look as she saw it. He had his reward in her fleeting, childlike delight. The candles were still blazing as it reached her, and the collective sighs of admiration brought a little colour to Florence’s pale cheeks. She placed the glossy confection in front of Emerald. Her face – her birthday face – was full of joy and pleasure, just as it had been on seeing the nineteen previous cakes presented to her.

Patience began to sing, ‘Happy Birthday To You!’ The others soon helped her, the pace increasing, with foot stamping from Traversham-Beechers and then Clovis, joining him, and then much laughter at the end.

‘Quick! Blow them out or you’ll ruin it,’ said Florence, producing a sudden knife.

‘The green is exquisite, Mrs Trieves,’ Charlotte graciously remarked.

‘Quick! Blow!’

Emerald leaned forward and took a breath. She blew, and as the little flames roared disobediently, was helped by Clovis and Patience, and the icing was saved, just in time.

The birthday girl – whose dress did not look too tawdry now, in the dim light and candle-glow – stood at the head of the table and plucked out the extinguished candles. An ironic dimple appeared in her cheek.

‘What shall I wish for?’ she asked, looking about the faces. ‘What?’

‘An improved disposition,’ said her mother sourly.

‘Tosh,’ said Traversham-Beechers. ‘Jewels and furs, gowns and a grand tour … cars, horses, bicycles!’

‘Your heart’s desire,’ said Patience (to a pained sigh from Charlotte).

John sought the bon mot. ‘A new settee for the drawing room,’ he said daringly at last, with a little music-hall mime of rubbing a bruised behind, which was met with much laughter from the family.

He could afford to buy me a hundred settees
, thought Emerald grimly, before she could stop herself,
and cushions for them, too.

‘Mrs Trieves?’ she said, taking her eyes from John. ‘Another cake as beautiful as this one?’

‘It might be my best work,’ said Florence. ‘I’m not sure I could repeat it. What about the departing of that blasted rabble before Sunday?’

‘No,’ said Charlotte, urgently, ‘none of that. Who cares about them? The house, my love, Sterne!’

‘Yes, go on, wish for the house. Come on: Sterne.’ This was Clovis.

Emerald’s dimple had disappeared. She had been planning that as her true wish all along. She stared down at the circle of green icing.

It’s perfectly round, like the land we’re standing on, but there’s no house on it, just my silly name. Perhaps it’s an omen
, she thought, but did not say it. No father and soon, perhaps, no house either.

The sugar-sparkling letters of the roses and the
Emerald
moved through the tears that filled her eyes. Her future was a desert and her only desire was to remain where she was. And why? She wasn’t even happy.

‘All this wishing,’ she said hopelessly, ‘all this wishing for things that won’t come true.’

‘If you wish for the best thing, you can’t lose.’

Emerald glanced up; it was Ernest. The sight of him was as steadying as a stirrup cup on a frosty morning and almost as heating.
Oh heavens
, she thought.

Taking the proffered knife, she plunged it into the cake, closing her eyes as first the icing, with a snick, and then the sponge gave sweetly to the blade.

‘I wish for the
best thing
,’ she said warmly.

The metal blade touched the glass at the bottom with a small tap and immediately – before she could even open her eyes again – as startlingly as an axe falling, and to the absolute amazement of everyone – a wild howl went up from Traversham-Beechers.

It was so loud, so feral and wolf-like that the whole party started, shocked, and stared at him.

The man continued to wail, impossibly high and long, like the desperate, lonely cry of animals in far, cold places; the saddest, cruellest sound a human throat could make. His breath held out unnaturally, raising the hairs on the bare forearms of the ladies, running a frisson down the spines of all present, and the wail did not subside until every other moving thing in the room had long since stopped.

Then – at last – it ended. He lowered his chin, licked his lips and, not even panting, said lightly, ‘To drive the devil out, don’t you know?’ And there was nothing to say to that. Any devil would have run screaming from the room by now.

Florence took the knife from Emerald’s hand and cut slices for everybody, and they all took up tiny silver forks and tucked in. Their dinner having been largely purloined by strangers, they hadn’t had so much to eat that the cake was spoiled, and that was a blessing.

‘Every cloud has a silver lining,’ said Patience happily. Next to her, Traversham-Beechers lowered his lids and scrutinised her, as if he would flick out his tongue and grab each of the seed pearls adorning her heaped, fair hair.

As they ate their cake, a faint song from the study started up; rough, soft voices, mixing:

I likes me half a pint of ale… I likes a little bit of meat…

little bit of fish … and half a pint of ale…

The travellers, fed but still unsatisfied, had begun to raise their voices once more.

Traversham-Beechers drummed his fingers on the table as he forked cake greedily into his mouth, snatching glances at the women around the table.

‘Excellent,’ he opined.

The talk floated around him along with the fragments of song.

‘You’ve managed most capably,’ John was saying to Emerald, across the table from him.

Katy smiled with a twinkle in her eye
,