The Winter Ground (30 page)

Grant turned on a sixpence.

‘What? They can’t even bite their tongues and say they liked her now she’s dead and gone? Oh, that’s cold, madam, isn’t it? And the poor pony! Still, I daresay there’s a lot of eating in it and they’re all foreigners, aren’t they?’

I was in bed that night, still reliving the last thrilling moments of
The Eagle
, when I heard a scuffling and whispering outside my door. Bunty wrinkled her brow at me, wondering whether to bark, and I shushed her, put a marker in my book and waited, hoping that whoever it was would fail to summon the courage and creep off again. I often wish we had a housekeeper at Gilverton, for maids in torment have woken me in the night fairly regularly over the years having run through their other options and found them wanting. I was led by my own mother, upon my marriage, in supposing a cook and butler quite sufficient for the household’s needs, but I overlooked the role of the housekeeper as a kind of matron to the lower servants; a service my own very motherly mother never minded taking upon herself but one which chafes at me like horsehair.

This evening, I was not to be lucky and at length there came a timorous knocking. Bunty sat up, towering over me on the bed, and wriggled her rear end against the blankets in anticipation.

‘Come in,’ I called. ‘If you must,’ I added under my breath, and I turned up the gas and laid my book aside.

It was not however a stricken girl and her quaking companion who stole inside, white-faced and knees knocking, but my own two sons, whose knees under the striped flannel might be still but who were certainly white-faced enough, with invisible lips and purple smudges under their eyes, although whether from trepidation or from killing deer was not immediately clear. I should like to think that the sight of their prey crumpling to the heathery ground could turn them pale, somehow. I do not mind the stag shoots in summer but I loathe it when my menfolk go off to shoot does and come back grinning.

‘What is it?’ I asked them. ‘Where’s Nanny?’

‘We wanted to ask you something, Mother,’ Donald said.

‘Can’t it wait till morning?’

‘Not really,’ said Teddy. ‘Maureen said that Nanny told her that Mrs Tilling said at supper that Grant told everyone at tea that you said to her that … is it true, Mother? Has Harlequin been shot?’

‘Is this what can’t wait until tomorrow?’ I asked them.

‘You must tell us, Mother,’ said Donald. ‘We can’t sleep until we know.’

‘And probably not after either or ever again.’

‘Now, don’t be silly,’ I said. ‘If there is one thing I cannot abide it’s sentimentality about animals. It’s one thing that Daddy and … that is, Daddy and I are in complete agreement there.’ Donald and Teddy were not bold enough to glance at Bunty, asleep again now, with her head on my knees, but I could tell that they wanted to. ‘Yes, Harlequin is to be shot,’ I went on rather more brusquely than otherwise I might have, ‘although he hadn’t been when I was at the circus earlier – but there is no call for you two to moon about it.’

‘We’re not mooning,’ said Donald, and he did sound genuinely stricken, I must say. ‘Is he … Are they shooting him because of his funny turn? Because he ran off?’

‘You must understand, boys,’ I said, rather more gently, ‘that a circus pony has to be as solid as rock, it’s not like a naughty pony that you or I might put up with because we love him and just make sure to wear a hat and keep off the hard roads. If one is standing on his back on one tiptoe and cantering round and round one must be able to trust him with one’s life. Literally, with one’s life. The one you should be sorry for is poor Ana. Think of that.’

Both boys bowed their heads, letting their long forelocks hang in front of them. Donald nudged Teddy and Teddy nudged Donald back. In the end they both looked up again together.

‘But he might not be shot yet?’ Teddy said.

‘
I
don’t know,’ I said, losing patience. ‘I shall find out for you tomorrow.’

‘Because he didn’t,’ Donald said, suddenly rushing forward and putting both hands flat on the bed. Bunty rolled over to look at him. ‘He didn’t have a brainstorm or even anything. He didn’t take off, Mother.’

‘And we don’t want him to die.’

I stared at them for a moment before speaking again.

‘Are you telling me that you lied?’

‘Well, you’ve always taught us not to say that someone lied, Mother. You always taught us to say that they “told an untruth”.’

‘Yes, Donald my dear, thank you for the lecture,’ I said, ‘but I’ve also always taught you not to tell untruths, haven’t I? You’d better explain exactly what happened.’

‘It was Mr Cooke,’ said Teddy. ‘After everything went wrong that night. After Inya screamed and everyone left and you told us to stay put, remember? Well, we stayed put and Mr Cooke came back, snorting like a dragon and glaring, thrashing his whip and he saw us and asked us what had happened.’

‘Well, he asked us if we lifted the box,’ said Donald. ‘Except he called it the dash box.’

‘Do you mean that he swore at you?’

‘Like anything. He was beside himself. Worse than Rumpelstiltskin.’

‘Don’t try to be to be sweet, Teddy. This is hardly the time. What letter did it start with?’

‘B,’ said Teddy.

‘All right, so he asked you if you had lifted the bloody box, then. Don’t be prim, boys – it’s most unappealing.’

‘Yes, he asked us that and honestly, Mother, if you could have seen him. He was towering over us, smacking his whip against his legs and gnashing his teeth. He looked ready to kill us if we admitted that we had.’

‘So you lied. You said you hadn’t.’

There was a long, confirming silence.

‘And then you lied to me.’

Another silence.

‘And then – good Lord – you lied to the police and when Inspector Hutchinson saw through it and tried to penetrate those bed knobs you have on top of your necks instead of heads, you toned down the nonsense but stuck with the lie.’

Great fat tears of shame were wobbling on Teddy’s lower lashes by now and Donald’s shoulders had slumped so far that I wondered his dressing gown didn’t slip off them and land on the floor.

‘I shall have to tell Daddy.’ Four beseeching eyes met mine. ‘At least. And Inspector Hutchinson. If not your housemaster too. I am thoroughly disgusted with the pair of you.’ The tears spilled at last and splashed down Teddy’s pyjama front. Donald screwed up his eyes and scrubbed his nose with the heel of his hand.

‘Will we go to jail?’ said Teddy. Donald, with a faint return of spirit, told him to shut up but looked at me for corroboration.

‘Of course not,’ I said. ‘But your names will copied down in a … in a big ledger at the police station and kept there, on file, in case you ever do anything so naughty ever again.’ I was only trying to frighten them but as I spoke I began to wonder whether it might not be true and I hoped that I should be able, in conscience, to keep it from Inspector Hutchinson after all. ‘Now, without embellishments or omissions, if you please, will you tell me what really happened?’

‘Of course,’ said Donald. ‘We’re really very sorry, Mother. What actually happened is that Anastasia came past and gave us the nod.’

‘Meaning we had to lift the box for her to go out next time round, you know.’

‘So we did and off she went and we put it back again.’

‘And how did she look? When she nodded to you?’

They considered this for a moment and it was a relief to me to see that they really were trying to remember and not just deciding what to say.

‘She looked a bit alarmed, didn’t she, Ted?’

‘Well, I’d say surprised, rather than alarmed. Alarmed is too dramatic-sounding. I’d say she was unpleasantly surprised.’

‘I agree,’ said Donald.

‘Honestly? She’d had some kind of nasty surprise? You’re not just—’

‘No, Mother, we’re not just anything. We’ve learned our lesson, really.’

‘Hmm,’ I said. ‘It’s Harlequin who’s learned your lesson, poor thing.’

At this they drooped again and I packed them off to bed, hoping that they would toss and turn all night thinking about him.

I myself spent a good hour, turning this way and that and punching my pillows until Bunty gave a long protesting moan and persuaded me to lie at peace. What a pair of goops I seemed to have introduced into the world, a world already well served with them and in no need of two more. A pair of what the army calls yes-men with withering disdain (even though it produces most of them), kowtowing to Pa Cooke, making up fluffy stories for me, not having the courage to come clean to Hutchinson and only being stopped in their tricks by soppiness about the damned pony. Well, I was jolly well going to let them sweat for a few days before I told them it would be our secret. I did not care to hear Hugh’s views on the matter and of course, the police and housemaster had only ever been a little – warranted – bluster of my own.

All the same, I set off rather earlier than usual the next morning and felt a great weight lift off my chest when I tiptoed into the stable tent and saw Harlequin tugging at his hay.

‘Oh, good boy,’ I told him and rubbed the stiff nap on his nose. He gazed at me from melted-chocolate eyes and chewed calmly. I patted a few of the liberty horses too, having been brought up not to have stable favourites, but they were not much interested in the giving and receiving of affection – typical beauties, who often do prefer to be admired from afar – and, although they submitted, their black eyes flashed and they paddled the ground with impatience until I gave up and returned to Harlequin.

‘What a lovely boy,’ I told him. ‘Best of the bunch.’

‘He is that,’ came a voice from inside the stall, making me jump. Groaning, Pa Cooke rose from the straw and brushed himself down.

‘Have you been here all night?’ I asked him.

‘Not the first time,’ he said. ‘Least I could do.’ He stroked Harlequin firmly and I thought I could see the sheen of a tear in his eye. ‘And I’ll not have been missed in the wagon, anyway.’

‘Well, I have very good news for you,’ I said. Quickly, I brought him up to date with the true history of Anastasia’s last exit and my offspring’s failings. ‘The question is: do we need to tell Inspector Hutchinson?’ Pa Cooke watched me with held breath. ‘Would he begin to doubt his conclusion if he knew that Anastasia was not out of control of her horse at all but had decided to leave the ring of her own accord? We already thought it unlikely that she would fall so badly, but if Harlequin was in his usual gentle frame of mind … do you see?’

‘I do, I do,’ said Pa. ‘Aye. If she was in control of her pony. I do see.’

‘But on another point,’ I said. ‘At least this chap is reprieved.’ There was a silence at that. ‘Isn’t he? I mean, there’s no need to do away with him now.’ Still Pa said nothing. He opened the stall gate and stepped out to stand beside me.

‘Time was a boss-man could do what he liked and never dream of ocht but the respect that’s due him,’ he said, which was cryptic enough to puzzle me, but he went on and things became clear. ‘Times being what they are, though, if I go back on my word now there’ll be nothing but smirks and whispers all winter, and all of them saying I’m an old man and needing my leisure.’

‘I had no idea circuses were such hotbeds of mutiny,’ I said.

‘No more had I, lass,’ said Pa.

Thus, somehow, Pa Cooke wrung out of me an agreement that he would spare Harlequin but that, to safeguard his standing amongst his rebellious crew, it would all be done on the quiet-like.

‘And speaking of which,’ he concluded, with a great air of magnanimity, ‘I don’t see no need to go blabbing on to the police. Your secret – your lads’ secret, I should say – is safe with me.’

‘I’m not at all sure I
want
their grubby little secret kept safe,’ I said. ‘They have a lesson to learn, after all. And besides …’ I wound down into silence; what I was thinking was that the very fact of Pa’s eagerness to sweep the new-found facts back under the carpet was a sign that he should not be allowed to. ‘But very well,’ I concluded at last, ‘for the time being. But on one condition only. That I continue, that is to say
redouble
, my efforts. And that if I make any material discoveries, any discoveries
ad hominem
, we dissolve our pact.’ Mr Cooke stared at me so I paraphrased. ‘If we find out who done it I shop him.’ My sons – or their reading tastes, at least – were good for something.

‘See this though, missus?’ said Pa, rubbing his face roughly. ‘What worries me is that, if you go lifting stones, you’re going to find a sight more than you’re looking for, you know that?’

‘And so I put the stones gently back down again,’ I said.

‘Shall I give the view halloo?’ said Alec, who was waiting for me outside, propped against the wing of the Cowley, filling his pipe.

‘A cautious tally-ho, anyway,’ I said, ‘although I’m annoyed to hear that I hide it so badly. Come with me.’

As I led him to the performing tent, I regaled him with the overnight news. He murmured, ‘Oh, jolly good, Dan,’ to hear of Harlequin’s ensured survival and gave a restrained ‘Dear me’ in reference to my sons, but otherwise bore the revelations so calmly that I wondered if he had missed the point of them.

‘You should give bulletins on ticker-tape, really,’ was his overall pronouncement once I was done.

‘You do see, don’t you,’ I demanded, ‘the implications of Ana deciding to dash out of the ring? She must have seen something which frightened her.’

‘Or offended her or angered her, yes.’

‘Oh. You do see.’ I am grateful, as a rule, that Alec is so swift on the uptake. ‘So we must ask ourselves
what
she saw.’

‘The fastest set in all of Perthshire, the Wilsons, you and me,’ said Alec.

I sat down on the bench where I had been on the night of the show and looked around me. The tent was as dankly cold as a dungeon today, impossible to believe that it was wood and canvas and that it had ever dazzled and resounded with lights and song. Alec sat down and leaned back against the bench in the tier behind him.

‘She had seen me before,’ I said. ‘So I’m in the clear and I’ll do you the honour of assuming it wasn’t you who put the willies up her. But it could have been anyone else.’