All I Have to Give (31 page)

In the end she’d had no choice. But, once she felt strong enough, she would sort out a secret home for them, and a nanny and other staff. Once that was done, she would visit Marianne and
collect her adorable girls on the way home. It wasn’t a good plan – it was sketchy and not fully formed yet – but somehow she would be reunited with her darling daughters.

So many frightening questions visited her, but she had no answers for them. Questions like: How would she keep them secret? How would she be able to stop them wanting to be a part of her life?
Her real life, not the life she would lead when she visited them, but her normal life.
Oh God, I feel so weak.

‘That was a big sigh, darling. Can I get you anything?’

‘Just peace and quiet, Eloise! Is that too much to ask?’

‘Forgive me. I only speak out of my love for you.’

‘Oh dear, I’m sorry, please don’t be offended. I’m not myself.’

‘I will fetch Aunt Marianne. She can always settle you.’

Edith felt relief when Eloise left the room. In the week since she and Marianne had arrived back in England, everyone had wanted to celebrate. But how could she, with the dreadful news she had
returned home to? Marianne had told her as gently as she could, but the impact of it all hadn’t really hit her until she’d stepped through the door of their Holland Park home. Oh, how
she wished the family had been at Hastleford Hall.
How did it happen that Douglas is not the new lord? How is it possible for life to have been turned so topsy-turvy, and in just a few short
months! How can I ever call Jay Tattumby ‘Lord Daverly’? It’s just ridiculous, unbelievably ridiculous!

Getting up from the chaise longue that her mother had loved, she walked over to the French doors. Mama had loved this room.
Oh, Mama, wherever you are, do you know my suffering? Do you
understand? In life you would have condemned me, and maybe even have banished me from home, but in death do you accept me?
She allowed her tears to flow and through her wet eyes saw the early
signs of summer vying with a winter coating as the sun banished the last of the slight ground frost. An unusual occurrence for this time of year, but although it was dry and sunny the temperatures
remained low and produced an overnight covering that whitened the world, when really it was blood-red, churning pain into everyone’s hearts. She didn’t know what was more painful:
thinking about the death of those around her, or thinking about the two tiny babies she’d left behind.

Born on the 19th of March, her twins had arrived a few weeks early and she’d had to fight to help them to survive. When she’d left they had been thriving. She had asked Petra to name
them, and she had called them Elka and Ania – such lovely names. Dear Petra and Aleksi, she owed them so much; and now she had taken even greater advantage of their kindness, but she knew
they loved the girls and would care for them until she could return. As promised, she’d transferred a large amount of money to them, to pay them back for all they had done for her and all
they were continuing to do. She would always keep them close to herself and the girls.

Petra and Aleksi had been afraid and heartbroken when the Russian Revolution broke out in March, thinking their daughter would be lost to them forever. But they had been happy when they’d
had a letter telling them that Marcelina was safe and had returned to the eastern sector of what used to be Poland.
Safe?
Edith wasn’t so sure about that.

Frightening things were happening in that area, she had discovered. Having access to the up-to-date news, once she reached Marianne’s, she’d heard of the terrible losses and
displacement of people in Eastern Europe and had feared for Petra’s daughter.

But she also had another niggling worry: she hadn’t heard from Petra and Aleksi since leaving them. She had given them Marianne’s address and had written to them, but although she
had been at Marianne’s for two weeks before returning home, no letter had come in return. This just didn’t fit with how they had been when they said farewell. Petra and Aleksi had taken
her to Paris in their battered old car. At the station she had held her twins to her. Her despair had been so deep that, when her train was announced as arriving imminently, she’d turned and
said, ‘I can’t go. I will stay lost forever. I cannot choose my old life over my girls.’

Petra had seemed afraid at first, but then she was probably just feeling anxious. ‘But you must – you cannot change your mind now!’

Aleksi had stepped in. ‘Petra, my dear, whatever Edith chooses to do will be the right thing. It is very hard leaving one’s children – we know that.’

Petra had calmed, and her outburst had become more understandable. ‘That is what I meant. Think of your family, Edith; your poor mother, not knowing if you are alive or dead. Her heart
must be breaking. Elka and Ania will be safe with us. You can come back for them, as you plan to do.’

With reluctance, Edith had told them that she knew they were right and that she had to go back, but it was the hardest thing she’d been called on to do in her whole life. The couple had
put their arms around her, and the hug the three of them and the girls were in lasted for several minutes. During it Petra said that Edith had become a second daughter to them, and that they would
never do anything to hurt her; whatever they did or said, she was to know that they did so in her best interests. Edith had worried about this comment. Was Petra trying to tell her something she
couldn’t voice? But the train had come in, and in the hustle and bustle of getting on it and the heartbreak of saying goodbye to her girls, she had forgotten her concerns.

Marianne had been ecstatic at seeing her and had accepted Edith’s story without question. She’d told Marianne that Albert had abandoned her after she’d had a fall. The fall had
knocked her out, and she had supposed Albert thought he could fare better without her. She said that she’d only learned what had happened from the farmers who took her in, because the
concussion she had suffered had resulted in her losing her memory.

When her memory came back quite suddenly, she told Marianne, she’d made her way south immediately. What she hadn’t planned on was the news awaiting her at Marianne’s. Feeling
strong, she had intended to travel home alone and visit her babies on the way, but what Marianne had to tell her rocked the core of her and sent Edith into a pit of despair she never thought she
could climb out of – a despair that still had her in its grip. If only she’d had news of her girls before they had left Nice. That would have been something to hang on to. But now she
was in limbo and didn’t know what to do or which way to turn.

The door opened, jolting her out of her dark thoughts. Marianne glided into the room. ‘Darling Edith, Eloise tells me you need help. I don’t know what I can do for you, for your pain
will take time to lift. I can only be a shoulder to cry on. But I’ve had an idea that might help a little. I’ve been wondering if you would like to go to Hastleford Hall for a few days?
Felicity has suggested that she and I spend some sisterly time together; and I thought, with Hastleford being so close, that she and Eloise could go to Rossworth and you and I could go to
Hastleford. What do you think?’

‘Oh, Marianne, I don’t know what I want.’

‘I know you don’t, darling, but one thing I know you do need is to visit your mama’s and Andrina’s graves. You need to say a proper goodbye. We could have a service in
the church for them while we are there. I am not used to such things, but Felicity told me it is a tradition over here, and it might help you.’

‘Yes, it would. It all seems so unreal. It is as if Mama and Andrina are there, in Leicestershire, and I only have to go there and all of this will have been a dream. This perception will
leave me, if I visit Leicestershire. I will see the truth for myself. But how I am going to face it all, I just don’t know. There will also be the ordeal of meeting up with Jay. I just cannot
come to terms with it all.’

‘Then you must face it head-on, my dear. As cruel as that sounds, you have to go to where your dear mama and Andrina are. And, yes, you do have to meet up with the new lord. I am quite
fascinated by it all. I think it makes a wonderful story. I cannot believe how easily your father and brothers have accepted it all. In France there would have been duels of honour fought, and
feuds opened up, with sides being taken and loyalties divided. You English are so calm and gentlemanly about these things. No fun at all. I will write a romance around it, but set it in France
– it will be my best novel yet!’

Her laughter sounded alien in the sombre atmosphere of the house. But it was also infectious, and Edith found herself smiling.

‘That’s better, my darling, though I feel there is something troubling you far deeper than the terrible losses we have suffered. Can you not tell me about it?’

This shocked Edith. Marianne had always had second sight. She desperately wanted to tell her the truth, but she couldn’t. Oh yes, Marianne would understand, but she couldn’t burden
her with such a secret and force her to deceive all those she loved. God knows it was tearing Edith apart, having to do so. She couldn’t inflict that on this lovely lady; nor could she share
the way her guilt was wearing her down. Mama had died because of the stress she was under, and most of that stress had been due to Edith’s disappearance. But then what could she have done?
Coming home pregnant would have killed her mother, just as surely as her absence had.
Oh God, I want an end to this pain!

‘Darling, tell me. Please tell me what is really troubling you. Let me help you.’

These words undid Edith. Falling to her knees, she felt her body heaving as she sobbed, loud sobs that echoed around the house. Bending with the weight of them, she beat her fists on the edge of
the rug. Mama’s rug. As she crawled towards the roses in the centre of it, her fists burned as she pummelled the pattern, which had no right still to be so vibrant when her mother, who had
loved it, was gone.

‘Edith, Edith, my dear, stop. Please stop.’ Marianne was on the floor beside her. Her lovely face was wet with tears. ‘Don’t do this to yourself. Whatever it is –
no matter how bad – I will love you and help you through it.’

‘I – I can’t . . . I – I have done . . . I mean, no . . . No, don’t make me; please don’t.’

‘All right. Come on, my darling. I don’t have to know what it is. Just knowing there is something, I can be by your side, supporting you in it, even if I’m not here. You will
feel my presence, my darling, and I will be your strength. Bind yourself to that, dear. All that I am is there for you.’

These words made Edith feel calmer. The burden of her secret was strangling her. The pain of her loss, and of parting from her little girls, was threatening to break her. But she would hang on
to what she still had, and what Marianne was offering her: someone to turn to.

‘I – I . . . Thank you. I feel better now.’ Rising, she went into Marianne’s arms and found a warmth to banish the chill from her, and reassurance in the strength offered
to her.

Now she could go forward. She would visit Hastleford Hall and say her goodbyes to her dear mama and the beautiful Andrina. She would meet the new lord with dignity and acceptance, and then she
would return and start to organize a plan for Elka and Ania, her darling babies.

And she would write to Laurent Pevensy, who had never been far from her thoughts since their chance encounter. She would write again to Petra and Aleksi. And when all this was done, she would
beg a visit to Marianne’s, where she was sure a letter from them would be waiting for her. On the way back she would pick up her children and begin her life again.

With these thoughts, a new determination entered her. She could go forward. She could, and she would!

Leicestershire and London, mid-May 1917
Friendship crosses the class divide

‘Ooh, bad luck!’

‘Bad luck? I’m hopeless at croquet, and always have been. It’s all right for you; being a surgeon, you have a steady hand and a good eye!’

Edith laughed at Eloise, but knew it was true. She also knew it had been too long since she’d practised her skill and her calling, and that she should be thinking of putting that right. Of
going back to the front even. Today she had received letters from Connie, Nancy, Jennifer and Mark. It was so good to hear from them.

All the letters had come together in one envelope, and all expressed their joy at her return. Each said how much they missed her. Jennifer’s held a surprise and gave a little twinge of
regret:

For a moment Edith felt sad. It had been good to feel the attraction that she knew Captain Mark Woodster had felt for her. But she was being silly. His attention had stroked her ego,
that’s all. She hadn’t felt anything for him like she had for Albert, or Laurent.

This thought had her standing and drawing in her breath as though she’d been thumped in the chest. Eloise’s antics soon settled the feeling as, scoring a hoop point, she did a jig
around the lawn calling out, ‘Ha, not so good now, are you? I might even win!’

Laughing at her, Edith said, ‘Oh, poppycock! Anyway, I give in. I need a drink. Darling, be an angel and summon Woodacre. Tell him to bring refreshments to the river’s
edge.’

‘You’re not going all morose again, are you, Edith? You are jolly hard work at times. Oh, I didn’t mean to offend you.’

‘No. Don’t worry, I know what you mean, and I am. But I’ve had enough of being frivolous and living on the periphery of life. I want to take hold of life again. I’d like
you to tell me about your work. I am so proud of you, and I want to help.’

‘Oh, Edith, that would be wonderful, and I know it will help you. It did me, when I lost Andrina and had to cope with you being missing. I know what you’ve been going through. I went
through it too, but I turned it into something very positive, and now I’m too busy to dwell on things.’