‘And its father? What about its father?’
It was a moment before the intended insult sank in, then she said bitterly, ‘How could you? Do you realize how perfectly beastly you’re being?’
He shrugged. ‘Yes. But it’s true, isn’t it? How do we know?’
‘I see. That’s what’s been festering in your mind. That Jon and I – that—’
‘It’s quite a natural possibility – under the circumstances.’ For the first time the coldness of his face changed to sadness. ‘I didn’t want things this way,’ he told her more quietly. ‘I loved you, Kate – I could still love you, as much – more perhaps –than any man ever loved – if this whole business could be wiped out. But after I left you this morning I went to see Jon intending to kick his guts out. Instead I listened. He was – different. He looked half dead. Gaunt. I couldn’t half kill an ill man. But his story was the same. I believed him.’
‘And so?’ she managed to say.
‘You and I will behave like civilized human beings,’ he told her emotionlessly, ‘to the outside world. But as individuals apart. No one need know the real state of affairs. You will appear socially as my wife, and act as hostess to any guests I have here. I shall be away a good deal, and frequently spend nights at my club. Luckily we already have the large adjoining dressing-room and bedroom. So there will be no sleeping problems.’
‘I see.’
‘I hope you do, and will act with propriety befitting your position. Not only for our mutual sakes, but for the children’s – especially the little stranger on the way.’
He waited for her reaction, watching her shrewdly.
She lifted her head inches higher and remarked, ‘So now you’re threatening me over the child.’
‘No. I’m reminding you of its position. In every practical way it will be treated as mine—’
‘It will be yours,’ she interrupted.
‘But we don’t know, do we?’
‘Oh!’ Suddenly all life seemed to drain out of her. She flung herself into an arm chair and lay back with her head on its silk cushion. Then surprisingly she heard him say in perfectly ordinary tones, ‘You must be tired. Can I get you anything?’
She shook her head dumbly and closed her eyes. A moment later she heard his footsteps cross the floor to the door. He paused a moment and said, ‘I’ll be careful not to disturb you when I return. It may be late. I shall use the other key.’ Then he was gone.
8
As high summer gradually turned to autumn the weather became grey and cloudy with morning and evening mists frequently thickening to thin fog. The new domestic routine at Woodgate took shape according to Rick’s plan. Kate, who felt more tired during this pregnancy than when she’d had the twins, would not have objected to the separate sleeping arrangements for herself and Ferris under more agreeable circumstances – indeed some-times she could have welcomed it but the cause of the sterile relationship between herself and her husband depressed her and increased her feeling of being deprived and unwanted. The household staff, although sensing a strain in the atmosphere were forced to accept the marital arrangement as probably correct and sensible. There was a certain obvious air of tension about their mistress – a lack of joy – that suggested she was over-tired.
‘It’s more than tiredness, if you ask me,’ Cook confided to the housemaid. ‘Either she’s ill, or there’s something wrong between them two. She doesn’t seem to notice anything properly any more. Oh, I’m not saying she doesn’t fuss about the house. More than she used to, I’ll grant you that – the mistress never was one before to bother about a bit of dust, or having things in the right place. But now she’s forever up and down – moving this here, that there, with a kind of fussed, tight look on her face as though she was fretting over something but couldn’t make out what it was. And the children; mostly she doesn’t seem to bother about them one bit, although—’ there was a significant pause before the oration continued – ‘the other day when I went into the garden to hurry Jake with the greens I passed her – the mistress – on the back drive – she’d been talking to the nursemaid who’d got the little one in that pram, and there were tears in her eyes. I wasn’t mistaken – actually tears. What do you make of that?’
Annie, the housemaid, shrugged. ‘Women go funny sometimes when they’re expecting,’ the girl commented. ‘Moods. It’s like eatin’, they fancy funny things. My aunt Mary—’
‘Oh, don’t go through all that again. How your Aunt Mary had a passion for frogs’ legs when she was in the family way just because she’d been on a holiday trip to France once where her cousin was training to be a chef. Enough of it, young Annie. This isn’t the time for old tales and gossip. We’ve both got things to do.’
In this way speculation continued from time to time. Whisperings and conjectures went on in an undertone, but the social life of Woodgate was superficially normal. Kate entertained Rick’s friends and business acquaintances whenever necessary with polite, if somewhat stony, competence and a veneer of dignity betraying no suspicion of anything disruptive in the household. But beneath her cold armour, there was a wild and restless anger at the unfairness, and Jon’s treachery.
One day in early September when Rick was away for the week in London, she made a point of driving herself in the dog-cart to a spot bordering Charnbrook at a time she knew Jon generally passed by during his round of the estate. She was lucky in her reckoning. She was turning a corner of a lane edging a field, when he appeared, luckily on foot. He was presumably on his way to a nearby small tenant farm.
He gave her a brief sidelong glance and would have passed on, but she reined and stopped the cart with a jerk, calling, ‘I want a word with you, Jon.’ Her heart was pounding; from the shrill note in her voice he knew she intended a confrontation.
He stepped aside. ‘Certainly. Can I assist you down, Mrs Ferris.’
She flushed, knowing the remark held an inference to her size.
‘No. You know what I want,’ she said, when she’d extricated herself from the dog-cart. ‘The truth.’
His eyes narrowed. They held an expression she couldn’t fathom – triumph, or was it a kind of suppressed wary rage. Certainly there was no pity or warmth.
‘About what?’
In spite of her determination to appear calm even conciliatory, in the hope he’d cooperate and somehow admit the truth to Rick, or in writing, her blood boiled with renewed indignity.
‘Don’t pretend,’ she said, as the rosy colour deepened in her cheeks. ‘That lie – that dreadful thing you told Rick about – about the day Cass found us in the Tree Studio when he was in America – that we’d been making love. You know it isn’t true. Then why? Oh, Jon.’ Her voice softened. ‘Please put it right. I know you were upset about – about losing Cass – that was why I was trying to—’
‘Seduce me?’ His voice cut the air like a knife.
Her mouth opened. ‘How dare you?’ she gasped.
Jon gave a short laugh of derision. ‘Oh, stop the dramatics, Kate. Don’t try the innocent on me. You wanted me then. You always have, haven’t you? From the very first chance you had of fluttering your eyes at me. Do you imagine others didn’t know it? Your parents? Ferris himself? And when the chance came of getting me alone at the Tree Studio you jumped at it. You’d been watching that day, hadn’t you? Because you’d somehow found out Cass wasn’t going to be there and you’d have me alone, but she changed her mind. I was in a state, I admit. But not too far gone not to know what you were up to. Oh, yes! You have very soft lips, Kate, hungry lips. It was sex, Kate, wasn’t it? Sex. And Cass!’ For a moment his face slackened and quivered. ‘She knew, she saw. And it killed her. So don’t talk about love, and comfort, because you don’t know the first thing about either.’
‘You have a foul rotten mind,’ Kate cried, suddenly throwing any sense of discretion to the winds. ‘If Rick was here, he’d—’
‘He’d what? Presumably he thinks as I do. Too bad. For you. But don’t im
agine I’ll lift a finger to put things right for you. You killed Cass, and may accept the consequences. I’ll never forgive you. Never.’
She half-lifted her whip to strike him, then let her arm drop, shocked by the renewed blaze of hatred on his face, and the realization that he really meant it. He really believed she was responsible for her cousin’s death and was wanting revenge for that dreadful day.
Numbly she watched him turn and stride away, cutting down a narrow path between high hedges to the little farm. Hopelessness engulfed her. She could see no way now of persuading Rick to accept the truth. Jon was obviously beyond reason over the matter of Cass, and there was no one else to help her.
She didn’t know how she was going to bear life without her husband’s love.
Even the thought of the coming child was a torment and she wished at this juncture it had never been conceived.
*
When Rick returned from London he informed her that some wealthy Americans had arrived at Charnbrook on his instructions, with the intention of looking over the Dower House, being interested in purchasing the property for holiday and business.
‘We shall be expected at the Wentworths’ for dinner the following Monday,’ he said with a quick probing glance at his wife, ‘and I hope you’ll put on as good a show of conviviality as possible. The name of the American is Carcodale. Hiram Carcodale. He’s already an important personality in the USA moving-picture project, and is anxious to make the acquaintance of certain theatrical personalities over here for our mutually planned magazine. They’re a Boston family with one daughter, I believe, and contact with the Wentworths, an example of the English aristocracy, will mean a good deal to them.’
Kate’s temper exploded.
‘You mean after what happened – after the scene with Jon and – and allowing him to get away with such rotten lies, you expect me to go to Charnbrook as a guest and pretend to be a friend of theirs – well!’ She turned and faced him fiercely, with a rustle of skirts – they were standing in the conservatory. ‘I won’t do it. It’s asking too much. Go if you must – if your – your loyalty to the Wentworths and your American moving-picture friends is stronger for them than for your wife. But of course’ – her lip curled, though the threat of tears choked in her throat – ‘it obviously does, or we shouldn’t be leading this sterile life—’ She broke off breathlessly staring.
‘If you’ve quite finished,’ he said, ‘we can perhaps talk sanely for a change?’ His face was as expressionless as a block of wood, although behind the façade his emotions churned with a wild desire to treat her as one might treat a rebellious child, followed by the pleasure of making-up, of sweeping the bundle of sweet sensuality into his arms in a flood of desire. She was wearing green, shining leaf-green that, against her cream skin and gleaming dark hair, imbued her with the quality of some rare exotic flower. He wanted her. Following the first week of their rift he’d never been free of a repressed need and longing for her supine satin-smooth limbs entwined with his – for the feel of his lips pressed against her skin, during the intimacy of deepest human experiences, of man’s love for woman. But forgiveness evaded him. Love, he decided, the gentle sentimental love expressed romantically in novels through the ages, was seemingly not in his nature. He had been soured beyond endurance by his conviction that another man had trespassed on his most private and precious of preserves. She was tainted – no longer the perfect pearl of his existence. But she still belonged; and whenever necessary he meant to see she recognized it.
When she remained silent he said with an effort, ‘I hope you understand. There must be no sign of disruption between us.’
‘I said I would not go.’
‘But you will, won’t you? You’re not ill; you’ll probably enjoy meeting the Carcodales. And’ – his glance became a little kinder – ‘for your benefit it’s hardly likely you’ll see much of Jon. He’ll be otherwise engrossed, discussing a certain business matter with Hiram that will take him back with them to the USA. I shall be thankful myself to be rid of the sight of him, and I’ve a shrewd idea the Wentworths will jump at the idea. It concerns photography – quite Jon’s line. I’ve already a new bailiff lined up part-time for Sir William and his lady wife’s worries over their neurotic son will be put at rest. So, for God’s sake, Kate, take that look off your face and make the best of things—’
‘If you had a shred of love for me left, you—’
‘If is a very useful word,’ he interrupted, ‘but hardly at this point,’ and he turned away without another glance at her.
9
On Sunday afternoon, before the arranged dinner party at Charnbrook, Emily and Walter visited Woodgate to make sure everything was well with their daughter and family, and with the information that they also had been invited to meet the American guests the following evening.
Rick had a wary look in his eyes for Kate as his in-laws gave the news. During the week his wife had been stubbornly silent about the subject whenever he referred to it and, although he had little doubt she’d agree to going without a further scene, still with Kate he could never be a hundred per cent certain. So he was relieved when she merely said with cool, apparent indifference, ‘Oh, yes, I shall be there, although I expect it will be rather boring. But Rick doesn’t fancy appearing without me. I suppose in America it would be considered infra-dig for one to go without the other. Aren’t they very family-minded in Boston?’
A slight frown puckered Emily’s forehead. ‘I don’t know about that.’ After a slight pause she continued, ‘You feel all right, don’t you, dear? You’re not overtired or anything?’
Kate sighed. ‘Don’t fuss, Mama. Why should I be tired? What have I to do?’
‘Well, with a house to run, two young children to care for, and another on the way, I should have thought there was plenty,’ Emily retorted a little more sharply.
‘Nursemaids and servants have their duties and they don’t like being interfered with,’ Kate answered shortly. ‘And Rick’s fussy over me not lifting anything or attempting any household chores in my – delicate state, although I must say he expects a good deal of me as a hostess.’
Emily was troubled.
As they drove away she said to Walter, ‘I’m concerned about our girl; she seems bitter over something, and that’s not like Kate.’
‘Forget it,’ Walter remarked, although he was bothered himself. ‘You can’t do any good by fretting. Families have good days and bad days. If there was anything really troubling her she’d let us know. As far as I can see Ferris makes a good husband, and they’re fond of each other.’
‘They were.’
‘What do you mean – were?’
‘Before all this moving-picture business got such a hold on him. A woman wants other things than business about her when she’s expecting. But whenever we’ve seen him lately – not often I grant you – still, each time he’s on about America and future this, future that – so you hardly know where you are. There’s other things than money too. Were you any happier after you made your pile, Walter? No. Life’s easier, of course, we see places, and have things we’d not got before, but it’s only the kind of way we lived that’s different not the quality. You’ve always had a thought for me. But Rick these days seems forever bent on going somewhere else and grabbing something new. A real buccaneer!’
Walter laughed. ‘Come on now, Emily, you’re imagining things.’
Buccaneer, he thought, the very idea. And yet in a way apt. Ferris did have a certain dominant ‘eagle’ look about him these days.
He did his best to dispel the slight discomfort Emily’s words had caused him, and on the appointed evening the American couple arrived at Charnbrook looking the picture of well-contented, middle-class affluence. To Rick’s satisfaction the men found instant rapport, possessing a similar down-to-earth recognition of a changing new world ahead. Both though sturdy patriots to their own soil, had a hankering to have a ‘finger in the other’s pie’ – a nibble of a social and bu
siness crust, so to speak.
Hiram to look at was large, slightly portly, with a genial smile and shrewd dark eyes that suggested a hint of Mexican forebears, rather than the Scots ancestry he boasted of. Eileen, his wife, referred to her connection to a Cornish grandfather who had emigrated to America during the mining crisis. She was small and plump, displaying diamonds that must have cost a fortune and a vital personality and laugh that inevitably reduced any faint unease of shyness in the party to a minimum. Only Olivia, despite a façade of graciousness, remained subtly aloof. She was watching Jon from time to time. He made it his business to avoid Kate as much as possible, which wasn’t difficult as Kate kept in the vicinity of her mother and Hiram’s wife. At dinner she was placed between her mother and the American’s daughter.
Elizabeth Carcodale, a rather gaunt, tall, horsy-looking girl, obviously found Jon attractive. She was not good-looking, but neither was she plain, and she certainly had the gift of conversation and telling an amusing tale. In spite of himself, Jon found he hadn’t lost the ability to smile. After dinner, while Wentworth took Rick and the older men to the billiard-room for a smoke and Olivia entertained the feminine guests in the drawing-room, Jon was diverted from any chance embarrassing encounter with Kate by a request from Elizabeth to show a collection of his photography – mostly stables of horses – a wish encouraged enthusiastically by her mother, and approved by Olivia, only grudgingly, since it meant a private session for the two young people in the Hon. Jon’s study, which was not, on such a short acquaintance, exactly protocol. Still, in this case, considering her son’s distressed state of mind, and the fact that he would probably be leaving with the Americans when they returned to the States, such a point as convention appeared almost a triviality. Anything was better than seeing him as he was; and as William had pointed out earlier, a possible friendship between the two young people could ease many of their financial problems. It was unfortunate from a traditional point of view that money nowadays seemed to be in so many wrong hands, socially. In Olivia’s young days a girl with such a dreadful accent would never have been accepted by the aristocracy. But if anything did come out of this new acquaintanceship – and she sensed William himself had given the idea an optimistic thought – he really seemed to have no sense of true pride these days – the couple would not be under their feet all the time, but mostly those long miles away across the Atlantic in Boston.