Kitabı oku: «The Darkest Hour», sayfa 10

8

Tuesday 16th July

Dolly Davis was standing at her kitchen window at home, the drying up cloth in her hand, staring into space. In ten minutes she would need to leave her small terraced cottage in Midhurst to walk up to the bus stop at the end of the street, ready for the long tour of local villages which would at last drop her off near Rosebank Cottage.

She had been thinking hard all night and was still turning her dilemma over in her mind. Did she trust Lucy Standish? Obviously Mr Mike did. He had told her on the telephone that he had given Mrs Standish a key to the house and to the studio and had told her she could come any day she chose, every day if she wished. He had made it very plain that she, Dolly, was not to interfere or question anything the woman did and was to give her every bit of help she could. To that effect Dolly had written down some dates and facts for Lucy, sitting down the night before with an exercise book and carefully making a list in her best writing of all the dates she could remember, starting with the date Evie had bought Rosebank Cottage. She was to write down the names and addresses of anyone she thought could help with researching the book and any details of the family she knew. Mr Mike said he was going to do the same, but he knew she probably had the key to so much more knowledge about Evie than he did. She knew he was flattering her; she wasn’t born yesterday. But on the other hand he obviously genuinely wanted her co-operation.

She had written down the names of Evie’s parents and grandparents, the name of the street where she had lived in London before she came to Rosebank, she couldn’t remember the number, the names of several of Evie’s friends, the ones who used to come and visit her. She no longer knew their addresses, if she ever did, but it was something to put on the list. She omitted the address of Christopher Marston. It was up to Mr Mike if he wanted to tell her about that side of the family.

At last she had put aside the notebook and stood up. Painfully she made her way up the narrow staircase, cursing her rheumatism, and she walked into the small second bedroom at the top of the stairs. Since her husband, Ronald, had died she had gratefully expanded her life into this second room which had been his for so long. He had suffered privately, as he did everything, from the pain of his long illness and died quietly one night seven years ago. She had not found him, still and peaceful in his bed, till morning when he was already cold.

She had waited a year, that was only decent, then she had sorted all his belongings into bags for the charity shops or for the bin men and moved some of her own things into the room, taking time to lay it out as she liked it with a comfy chair, a table and her small electric sewing machine and cupboards and a light so she could sew in there in her own domain. In one of the cupboards was a large cardboard box. She hauled it out and sat down with it on her knee.

As soon as she had realised what Christopher Marston was up to, clearing all Evie’s personal stuff out of Rosebank, she had saved what she could. It hadn’t been much, the diaries, hidden in the chest of drawers in Evie’s bedroom, two small sketchbooks and the old log book which had lain under the diaries. She had glanced at the log book and frowned in disappointment. She had thought it would be Ralph’s but it belonged to some man she had never heard of. Nevertheless she tucked it into the box with the rest and that same night, quietly, after Christopher and his wife had left, their car stuffed with everything of value in the house, she carried it up the lane and lugged it home on the bus.

She chewed her lower lip thoughtfully. What to do? She didn’t want to ask Mr Mike. He would be furious with her for taking it all in the first place but she was unrepentant about that. She did it for Evie. Instinctively she had known that Evie would hate to have anyone, never mind her difficult and rude grandson, poring over her diaries.

She glanced at her watch and pulled off her apron. Time to go. She would think about what to do during the day and make a judgement then.

Lucy was already at work when Dolly arrived at the cottage at exactly nine a.m. The old lady frowned a little, but glancing quickly round she was satisfied that Lucy hadn’t touched anything or messed up the kitchen. She opened the door to the cupboard under the sink and pulled out her polish and dusters. At ten thirty she would go over to the studio and take her a cup of coffee. Until then it was up to Lucy. If she had the manners to come in and say good morning that would be a mark in her favour.

Lucy had pushed open the door of the studio with some trepidation when she arrived that morning after a sleepless night. She stood in the doorway and stared at the scattered brushes on the floor. When the jar fell she had not waited to pick them up. She had slammed the studio door and locked it. When she climbed into the car she was astonished to find that her hands were shaking.

Taking a deep breath she put down her bags and walked over to pick up the scattered contents of the jar. She put it back on the table and pushed it firmly to the centre, well away from the edge, then she glanced nervously round the room. Everything was as she had left it last night. Or was it? She looked at the pile of boxes against the wall. Had they been rearranged? She frowned. Perhaps Dolly had arrived early. Walking over to the wall she stooped and picked up the top box. She didn’t remember seeing it before. Her heart thumping she put it down on the table and pulled open the flaps at the top. Within moments she was completely absorbed. Amongst the shabby cardboard files she found two or three that contained flimsy carbon copies of Evie’s letters. They were smudged and faded and occasionally so faint as to be illegible. Obviously Evie went on using each sheet of carbon paper long after it was too worn to be of much use, but there was enough there to show that these were the letters she wrote to galleries and exhibition organisers about showing her work. Lucy felt a shot of adrenaline run through her as she saw the names of various paintings listed again and again, one or two of which she recognised, several which she did not. This must be an inventory of her basic exhibits, the ones she sent off round the country on tour. At the top of each letter was the name and address of the place to which they were going. She found a sequence of dates spanning some five years of Evie’s main exhibitions. Perhaps elsewhere in the studio she would find the catalogues themselves. Dolly was forgotten. This was like striking gold.

An hour later Dolly arrived with a tea tray. Today there was one cup. ‘I don’t want to interrupt or get in your way,’ the old lady said coolly.

Lucy looked up then she glanced at her watch. It was nearly ten o’clock. She should have gone over to the cottage to say good morning. Reluctantly she pushed the files to one side. ‘You are not interrupting, I promise. You haven’t brought a cup for yourself. Can I fetch one so we can have coffee together?’

Dolly looked at her suspiciously. ‘I assumed you hadn’t come in because you wanted to be left alone.’

Lucy shook her head. ‘I’m sorry. It was me, not wanting to get in your way. I thought you must be so used to having the place to yourself that I would be under your feet, but I would love to talk to you, when you have some time. I so much want to hear your reminiscences about Evie. You and Mike are the only people I’ve met who remember her, and you both knew her so well.’ She was cursing herself for putting Dolly’s back up again. She slipped off her stool and stood up with a smile. ‘Can I fetch that cup? There is enough in this cafetière for two and it smells so gorgeous.’

Dolly hesitated then she nodded. ‘No, you stay here. I’ll fetch it.’

When she came back she brought a plate of biscuits.

By the time she left that evening Lucy had filled several pages of her notebook with anecdotes and she was clutching Dolly’s exercise book, but she did not know about the box of diaries. The old woman was still hedging her bets.

September 9th 1940

On September 7th Churchill believed that invasion was imminent. High Command at last used the codeword, ‘Cromwell’ and service personnel were issued with side arms and live ammunition. Roads in the south were blocked and guards on the south coast were reinforced. All temporary leave had been stopped. Ralph telephoned home once or twice to reassure his mother, but patrols were constant and the pilots were becoming increasingly exhausted. There was no word from Tony.

Since she was a child Evie had kept her diary under her mattress. She did not think her mother would snoop in her bedroom but she was not taking any chances, and especially not now with the new glorious secret which had overwhelmed her every waking second. She was in love, deeply and overwhelmingly in love. She could not get the thought of Tony out of her head. Everything she did on the farm, every moment she was awake she was thinking about him and at night she dreamed of him as well. And now, overwhelmed with worry, she hadn’t seen him to speak to for three days even though she had biked down to Westhampnett early and spent the whole day loitering round the airfield under the pretence of making sketches. No, not pretence. She was sketching but she had been distracted every few minutes by the possibility that he would appear. He had been declared fit to fly by the local doctor and was once again on operational standby. The squadrons were in constant action, flying out on sortie after sortie. Their lunchbreak never happened and tea was being made for them out in the dispersal huts with the WVS ladies taking their van over to them as they waited for refuelling. She saw Tony in the distance twice and each time he grinned at her and waved, but he was with the other pilots and she knew better than to interrupt or draw attention to herself.

It was nearly six o’clock when Eddie drove down to the airfield, left his car by the gate and strolled in past the guard.

‘Evie?’ He stood beside her and looked over her shoulder at her sketch. It was rudimentary, concentrating on Tony, one face standing out amongst several others who were mere outlines. He made no comment. ‘Your mother asked me to come and fetch you,’ he said after a moment. She had not looked up to greet him ‘You are late for milking and she said you hadn’t done any of your chores today. She is worried.’

Evie scowled. ‘I’ll come back when I’ve finished this.’

‘No, now, Evie. It’s late.’ Eddie saw the guard from the perimeter gate heading his way and groaned. ‘Now they are going to tell me off for coming in here. The security is appalling on this airfield. I should make a complaint to higher authorities. Only that would stop you coming down here too.’

Evie looked up at the implied threat. ‘You wouldn’t.’

‘I don’t want to.’ He sighed. There was no point in putting her back up even further by mentioning his feelings about her visits down here to sketch Tony. ‘Come on, Evie.’

‘I didn’t realise the time. I’ll collect my bike.’

‘Leave it. It will be perfectly safe. I’ll run you back to save time.’

‘No!’ Evie snapped. ‘I’ll come when I’ve finished.’ She didn’t want to speak to Eddie. She didn’t want to see Eddie. She wished she had never made love to him. If it wasn’t for his role in furthering her career, she would tell him to go away and never come back. Whatever she had felt for him in the past was nothing compared to what she felt for Tony. Her whole body yearned for the young airman in a way she had never experienced before. She was overwhelmed with longing. In contrast the thought of getting into the car with Eddie was suddenly repugnant to her.

Eddie leaned across her and took the sketchbook and pencil out of her hand. ‘You will come now, Evie. I promised your mother.’ He frowned at her as she rounded on him.

‘No!’

He held up his hand before she could protest, his temper barely in check. ‘Have you any idea just how worried she gets when you are down here? You are in danger every second you are here. The Germans aim for the airfields, you know. I am amazed the CO lets you come here at all. Your mother is frantic about your safety. She doesn’t say anything because she knows you want to do your bit for the war effort, but you owe it to her to come home when you say you will. It is bad enough for her to have to worry about Ralph all day every day, up there.’ He gestured towards the clouds where a dozen or so planes were circling ever higher, small black dots heading suddenly towards the horizon as a message from ground control sent them on the right vector to encounter the enemy.

She slumped back onto her seat on the old oil drum which had become her favoured perch. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t think.’

He smiled at her ‘No, well, you have now. So let’s get back and put her out of her misery at least as far as you are concerned, OK?’

Wednesday 17th July

Dolly had given Lucy the address of the Lucas farm and the following afternoon Lucy drove the half dozen or so miles to the village of Chilverly, taut with anticipation. Pausing in the village to squint at her road map she turned the car up a narrow lane on the far side of the village and drove the few hundred yards to the gate at the end. There she parked and climbed out. Box Wood Farm. Evie’s parents’ farm, the home Evie had known for so much of the early years of her life. And Ralph’s home too. She shivered. She stood for a moment on the gravelled driveway studying the front of the building, aware of a sudden lump in her throat. It was a lovely traditional farmhouse, lying in the golden sunshine in a gentle basin in the Downs, the upper storeys white-painted and timber-framed, the ground floor a soft terracotta, built with ancient lichen-stained bricks. It had been separated from its land many years earlier, Mike had mentioned, and now boasted only an acre of beautiful gardens and an orchard, but, beyond the gardens, the downland fields were still populated with sheep as they must have been in Evie’s day, the short-cropped grasses interspersed here and there with patches of woodland. The front of the house was curtained with wisteria and the door decorated with urns full of geraniums and variegated ivies. Overhead swallows were threading the air with high-pitched twitterings as they swooped overhead much as they had done in Evie’s day.

The door opened and a tall, thin woman appeared on the steps. ‘Lucy Standish?’

Lucy took a deep breath and smiled. She walked forward, hand outstretched. ‘Mrs Chappell? Thank you so much for agreeing to let me come.’

Elizabeth Chappell was older than she had first appeared, nearer seventy than fifty, Lucy guessed, but her fine bones and English rose complexion gave her a glow of youth which Lucy doubted she would lose even in her eighties or nineties. She followed her through into a large elegant kitchen and stared round.

Elizabeth smiled. ‘A farmhouse kitchen, which it really was when we bought the house. The place was a tip. We didn’t buy it from Evelyn Lucas of course. There had been at least two other owners in the intervening years, but I like to think she would recognise it again now.‘

Lucy looked round at the butler’s sink, the dark green, four-oven Aga, the handmade cabinets, and secretly doubted if Evie would have recognised it at all. She knew Evie’s kitchen at Rosebank Cottage and she didn’t think this elegance was Evie’s thing. But then it would have been Evie’s mother’s kitchen in those days and she didn’t know anything about Rachel. Not yet. There was no mention of her in the letters so far, no clues as to what Rachel was like at all. She had only discovered Evie’s parents’ names from an offhand remark of Mike’s and then in Dolly’s helpful little list.

It was rather like being shown round by a house agent. Elizabeth Chappell gave her the whole tour, room by room, finishing at last in the attic.

‘I understand this was Evelyn’s studio,’ she said as they went in. It had been laid out as a children’s playroom, complete with a model railway on the floor. ‘The grandchildren,’ Elizabeth said over her shoulder. ‘They live in London but they love coming down here. It keeps them amused all day.’

Lucy smiled. ‘I can imagine. It looks very inviting.’

Where was Evie? Where were the echoes, the memories, the hints of the room’s artistic past? The beams were still there but the walls between the stud framing of the roof were a pale blue, the floor had been sanded and sealed to a golden tan and the windows and skylights had new wooden frames with locks on their elegant ironwork latches.

‘I don’t suppose Evie haunts this house?’ Lucy asked tentatively. Or Ralph, she added silently. Why was it she felt compelled to ask that wherever she went? She softened the question with a rueful smile, implying that she was joking.

To her astonishment Elizabeth nodded, her face suddenly taut with anxiety. ‘It is strange you should ask. We have often wondered. There are footsteps sometimes, you know, and Georgie, that’s my eldest grandson, who was about seven at the time, said he could smell paint up here. Can you smell paint?’ She held Lucy’s gaze for a moment. ‘No. Neither can I, but occasionally Georgie says it was very strong and oily. We took him to an art shop and he identified the smell as oil paint. None of us is artistic so he wouldn’t have smelled it here, and the house itself was redecorated a while ago and anyway house paint smells nothing like oil paint.’

Lucy felt a jolt of unease deep in the pit of her stomach. ‘No one is afraid, though?’ she asked cautiously.

There was a moment’s silence. ‘Not of the smell, no.’ Elizabeth put her hand up to the necklace she was wearing over her cotton sweater and twisted it nervously. She had moved away from her visitor and was standing by the train track staring down at it as if lost in thought. I’m often alone here,’ Elizabeth went on at last. ‘My husband travels a lot.’ She paused, as if regretting that she had said too much.

Lucy hesitated. ‘My husband died a few months ago,’ she said at last. ‘I know how it feels, being alone.’

‘My dear, I’m sorry.’ Elizabeth looked at her as if seeing her for the first time. ‘So you understand. He’s supposed to have retired but he runs a consultancy, advising people on buying overseas properties, and,’ she hesitated for a moment, then continued softly, ‘when I am here by myself, at night, sometimes I think I can hear people in the house. It is a big house for one person.’ She gave an awkward smile. ‘When it is full of family and children and my daughter’s dogs it comes alive, then it belongs to us. But when I am by myself I am sure it still belongs to the Lucases. They were here for generations, you know.’

For a moment Lucy was stunned. ‘But you said there were other families here in between,’ she said at last.

‘Yes. And of course it could have been them.’ Elizabeth shook her head. ‘But it isn’t. Evie’s brother was killed, you know, in the Battle of Britain. There’s a memorial to him in the village church. I think his mother went mad with grief.’

Lucy held her breath, staring at her in horror, intensely aware of the silence around them.

‘I hear her crying,’ Elizabeth went on almost under her breath. ‘I tell myself it’s the wind in the chimneys, perhaps an owl screaming into the night, but it isn’t. It’s Rachel. I sometimes think I can’t bear it.’ She gave a small wistful smile. ‘I’m sorry, my dear. You must think I’m ga-ga.’

‘How do you know it’s Rachel?’ Lucy asked at last. Her voice was husky.

‘I just know.’ It was a whisper. She shuddered. ‘Let’s go downstairs. Do you mind? I’ll make us some tea. Then you must see the outbuildings.’ Suddenly her voice was stronger. ‘They were all farm buildings in Evie’s day and I think you’ll see they have probably changed much less than the house has. In fact I doubt if they have changed in hundreds of years. The land itself is all owned by a huge company now. There is a farm manager who lives on an estate the other side of Chichester.’

Lucy followed Elizabeth down the two flights of stairs back into the kitchen. While they waited for the kettle to boil on the Aga Elizabeth disappeared into the old-style walk-in pantry to find some biscuits and Lucy stared round the room. With part of herself she was listening, afraid she was going to hear Rachel’s cries.

The kitchen was immaculately tidy. There had only been one car outside, a smart new Mini. It was obvious that Elizabeth’s husband must be away on one of his trips. The woman was living alone in the house with nothing but the ghosts of the past for company.

She looked up as her hostess put the plate of biscuits in front of her. ‘Do people in the village remember the Lucases?’ she asked, trying to change the mood.

Elizabeth shook her head. ‘I doubt it. I don’t know. To be honest we don’t mix with the village much any more.’ She reached down the teapot from a shelf and set it on the hotplate to warm.

‘But your family come down to see you?’ As soon as she had said it Lucy regretted it. She had already guessed what the answer would be

‘They used to. All the time. But they have other calls on their time now. The children have grown out of the countryside. They want to go abroad or spend the holidays with their friends. You know how it is.’ Elizabeth helped herself to a biscuit and broke it in half, scattering crumbs on the pine table before putting it down without tasting it. She didn’t seem to notice. ‘There was a time when I could have offered you a homemade biscuit. Not any more. It’s not worth making them just for me. I bake when there is something on in the village of course. I do my bit, but even that has been taken over now by young families. The mothers are very energetic, very bossy,’ she laughed quietly. ‘They like to do things their way.’

Lucy’s heart went out to her.

Behind them the kettle began to whistle. Elizabeth stood up abruptly and went over to the Aga. She made the tea and came back to the table. ‘There you are, my dear. I am so sorry; you must think I am pathetic. Drink that, and then we’ll go outside. I love my garden. It’s mine. Out there I have no sense of Rachel at all. Out there I feel as if I still have a use in the world. I’ll show you.’

Rachel. Once more she was talking about Rachel. Only in the studio was there an echo of Evie left behind.

The garden, as Lucy had glimpsed when she first walked up the drive, was lovely. It was formal, carefully planned and obviously much loved. She looked round in delight. ‘You make me feel so ashamed. Our, that is my, garden is so tiny.’ When would she get used to talking in the first person singular. ‘It was very precious to my husband and me, but since his death I have neglected it terribly, there seems to be so little time for it now.’

Elizabeth nodded. ‘Being alone is very hard to bear.’

Lucy bit her lip. Without quite knowing why she recognised that she had been tactless. She wondered suddenly whether Elizabeth’s husband was alone on his trips abroad and guessed immediately that he was not.

‘Evie would have approved of this garden,’ she said softly, trying to change the subject. ‘She loved flowers. Her own garden at Rosebank Cottage is very pretty. Not formal like this. It is very much a classic cottage garden, but it shows the love and care she must have lavished on it for years.’

‘You know her grandson, you say.’ Elizabeth fished in her pocket and brought out a pair of secateurs. She must always have them with her, Lucy guessed, just in case something needed dead heading. ‘He came here once. He wanted to know if we had any of her paintings.’

‘Mike came to see you?’ Lucy frowned. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t realise you knew him.’

‘Christopher Marston. A nice man. We keep in touch now and then.’ Elizabeth leaned forward and snipped off the broken stem of a rose.

‘Christopher,’ Lucy echoed thoughtfully. ‘Mike is his cousin. He owns Evie’s cottage. I gather the arrangement was that Mike got the house and Christopher, the paintings.’

Elizabeth nodded. ‘I think he mentioned something to that effect. He felt short-changed, I gather. He said a lot of the paintings were missing and he suspected they were stashed – I believe that was the word he used – here somewhere.’ She gave a bleak smile. ‘I am afraid I had to disappoint him. There was nothing here when we bought the house. It was totally empty and nearly derelict.’

‘Evie’s paintings are very valuable,’ Lucy said, ‘perhaps the more so because so few seem to have survived.’

‘And you too were hoping they might be hidden here?’

‘No!’ Lucy looked at her, aghast. ‘Oh no! I’m not here because of that. I thought I explained. I am writing Evie’s biography.’

‘You did tell me that, yes. I’m sorry, my dear. Cynicism is one of my more disgusting failings.’ Elizabeth sighed and reached out to clip off a shrivelled rosebud before determinedly pocketing her secateurs again. ‘Come with me. We’ll go and look in the barns. Then you will be able to describe them in your book.’

Lucy followed her across the lawn to a range of neat outbuildings around the back of the house. They were meticulously cared for, with clean windows, black boarded walls and peg-tiled roofs. Beside each door there was a tub of scarlet geraniums. Elizabeth pulled open the door of the first.

‘I have been told this was probably a dairy. The actual barns were pulled down when the land was sold. They were too small for modern equipment apparently, but these, because they were all grouped round the back yard, were sold with the house, for which I am rather pleased. They are attractive buildings and as you can see very old.’

She gestured to Lucy to go in.

As she stepped inside the gravel of the yard outside gave way to rounded cobbles. There were broad low shelves around the walls and large nails protruding from the beams which had obviously been used in the past for hanging things on. The building was completely empty. Lucy took another hesitant step forward and stopped dead as she was enveloped in a wave of cold unhappiness. It seemed to leach from the walls on every side and cling to her skin like some kind of damp mildew. She shuddered. As she turned hastily towards the door she remembered her camera.

‘May I take a photo?’ she called out. There was no reply.

She took a couple of photos and hurriedly made her way back to the door. In the fresh sweet-scented air of the courtyard she took some deep breaths. To her surprise she found that her hands, as she returned the camera to her pocket, were shaking.

‘You felt it, didn’t you?’ Elizabeth had been leaning against the wall a few feet away staring down at the tub of plants at her feet. She had glanced up as Lucy appeared.

Lucy gulped in another breath, trying to steady herself. ‘What happened in there?’

Elizabeth shrugged her shoulders. ‘Most people say there is nothing there. You seem to be sensitive.’

‘Is it Rachel?’

‘I assume so. I imagine she had to go on running the farm. It was the war. Every drop of milk would have had to be accounted for. Butter. Cheese. I expect they made it all here.’

‘Would you mind if I made some notes about all this?’ Lucy asked suddenly. ‘You have a far better grip about the family than I have. I started from a baseline of nothing. Mike is telling me some stuff, but he is, to be honest, not all that interested in the family history. He comes up with afterthoughts every now and then. I am being allowed to look through what are left of her papers but there is very little there that is personal. It is mainly bank statements and stuff like that.’

‘So, was she very rich?’

‘Ah, from the statements, you mean. No. As far as I can see she was actually quite poor. Artists often were, weren’t they, in their own time?’

They had begun to walk slowly down the line of buildings. There were several looseboxes, all equally neat and empty, another couple of larger outbuildings, one of which contained a ride-on mower and a wheelbarrow, with rakes and spades and forks hanging on the wall, obviously the heart of the gardening empire, and there was an open-fronted cart shed with wonderfully twisted beams. In the distance Lucy could see a small pond, carefully fenced. On it a pair of moorhens swam anxiously back and forth uttering little calls of alarm.

‘Well, that’s it.’ Elizabeth drew to a halt.

‘It’s very kind of you to have shown me everything.’

‘Please, don’t go. Not yet.’ For a moment Elizabeth seemed quite panic-stricken. ‘You wanted to make some notes and take some pictures. You ought to snap the studio. Please, why don’t you stay and have some supper? You can wander round on your own as much as you like.’

For a moment Lucy was hesitant; the atmosphere of Box Wood Farm was getting to her, as was Elizabeth’s neediness, but it was, she realised, too good an offer to turn down.

After a moment she nodded. ‘I would love to. Thank you.’

She took dozens of pictures and made notes in almost every room of the house, lingering in the studio wondering if she could smell the taint of oil and turpentine in the air as she had at Rosebank. There was nothing. It was almost sterile up there save for an almost imperceptible smell of dried wood from the beams.